Plato's Epistemology: Being and Seeming 0198867409, 9780198867401

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Plato’s Epistemology

Plato’s Epistemology Being and Seeming J E S SIC A M O S S

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1 Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP, United Kingdom Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries © Jessica Moss 2021 The moral rights of the author have been asserted First Edition published in 2021 Impression: 1 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by licence or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Control Number: 2020950722 ISBN 978–0–19–886740–1 DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198867401.001.0001 Printed and bound in Great Britain by Clays Ltd, Elcograf S.p.A.

For my mother, Rita Moss, with all my love.

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Contents Acknowledgments ix Introduction: What Is Plato’s Epistemology About? 1. Epistêmê and doxa versus knowledge and belief 2. The plan

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1. Plato’s “Two Worlds” Epistemology 1. The Two Worlds debate 2. The prima facie case for Distinct Objects 3. A brief history of the Distinct Objects interpretation 4. Distinct Objects beyond Plato 5. A new starting point

13 18 26 35 42 48

2. Plato’s Objects-Based Epistemology 1. Powers and their accomplishments are individuated by their objects 2. Powers and their accomplishments are defined by their objects 3. Powers and their accomplishments resemble their objects: cognition of like-by-like 4. Distinct Objects confirmed 5. Objects-Based Epistemology

50 52 61 67 79 82

3. Epistêmê Is of What Is 86 1. Epistêmê and what is 88 2. Which sense of ‘being’? 93 3. Being as the ontologically superior 96 4. What is ontological superiority? 101 5. Epistêmê and the ontologically superior 105 6. Epistêmê is of what is, revisited 107 7. The Basic Conception of epistêmê 111 4. The Basic Conception of Epistêmê at Work 113 1. Truth 114 2. The explanatory requirement 115 3. Clarity, stability, and precision 116 4. Restriction to Forms 119 5. Objection: philosopher-rulers’ epistêmê 122

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viii Contents

5. What Is Epistêmê? 132 1. Extant interpretations 133 2. Counterparts 134 3. A deep grasp of ultimate reality 136 4. Epistêmê and knowledge 137 5. Why epistêmê? 138 6. Doxa Is of What Seems 140 1. Doxa and seeming 143 2. What seems 146 3. Being-seemed-to 149 4. The Basic Conception of doxa 153 7. The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work 1. Truth and falsity 2. Inferiority 3. Instability 4. Persuasion 5. Restriction to perceptibles 6. Objections: Doxa of Forms?

155 155 157 158 158 161 180

8. What Is Doxa? 196 1. Doxa as dreaming 197 2. Doxa as atheoretical thought 199 3. Counterparts and extant interpretations 202 4. Doxa and belief 205 5. Why doxa? 206 9. Epistemology in the Earlier Dialogues 1. Epistêmê in the earlier dialogues 2. Doxa in the earlier dialogues 3. Distinct Objects and objects-based epistemology in the earlier dialogues

207 208 213 214

10. Epistemology in the Theaetetus 219 1. Theaetetus’ first definition 220 2. Refuting Theaetetus 225 3. Theaetetus’ second definition: two senses of doxa? 227 4. Theaetetus’ third definition 230 5. Epistemology beyond the Two Worlds Dialogues 233 Conclusion: Plato’s Ethical-cum-Metaphysical Epistemology Bibliography Index Locorum Index

234 243 249 254

Acknowledgments I owe many thanks to many people for their help with this book. Cian Dorr, Toomas Lott, Whitney Schwab, and Damien Storey read and discussed multiple versions and drafts, and were wonderful interlocutors. Enormously helpful discussion of various parts came from: Francesco Ademollo, Merrick Anderson, Cinzia Arruzza, Rachel Barney, George Boys-Stones, Sarah Broadie, David Bronstein, Qian Cao, Victor Caston, Tim Clarke, Adam Crager, Carlo DaVia, David Ebrey, Matt Evans, Gail Fine, Emily Fletcher, Jane Friedman, Natalie Hannan, Stephen Hetherington, Sukaina Hirji, Sean Kelsey, Gabriel Lear, Sara Magrin, Marko Malink, Susan Sauve Meyer, Alex Mourelatos, Jacob Rosen, David Sedley, Gabe Shapiro, Allan Silverman, Nick Smith, David Sosa, Iakovos Vasiliou, Katja Vogt, Heather Whitney, Jessica Wilson, and more people than I can name in audiences at Austin, Berkeley, Chicago, Columbia, Indiana, MIT, Northwestern, NYU, Penn, Pittsburgh, Princeton, Stanford, Wellfleet, and the West Coast Plato Workshop. Oscar Dorr did excellent eleventh-hour editorial work. Finally, I  am grateful to the exceptionally helpful referees at OUP, and to Peter Momtchiloff for all his work. Parts of this material appear in “Plato’s Doxa,” in Analytic Philosophy 61, and in “Is Plato’s Epistemology about Knowledge?” in What the Ancients Offer to Contemporary Epistemology (Routledge, 2019), edited by Stephen Hetherington and Nicholas D. Smith. Thank you to the editors and pub­lishers for their permission to reprint.

Introduction What Is Plato’s Epistemology About?

That correct doxa is something different from epistêmê is ­something I do not at all seem to be conjecturing, but, if I were going to claim that I knew anything—and there are few things I would claim that about—this one, at any rate, I would include among the things that I know. (Meno 98b)1 Throughout the dialogues Plato contrasts a superior kind of cognition with an inferior one, often calling the superior kind epistêmê and the inferior kind doxa.2 He studies the nature of each and the differences between them, he argues for the superiority of epistêmê, and he discusses how to achieve it. What is Plato doing when he does all this—what kind of project is he undertaking? The answer will seem obvious: epistemology. That is, Plato is engaged in the same kind of investigation philosophers engage in nowadays when they study knowledge and belief. Indeed, Plato had a large part in inventing the whole field of epistemology, and gave us some of the problems and views still central to it today.3

1  ὅτι δέ ἐστίν τι ἀλλοῖον ὀρθὴ δόξα καὶ ἐπιστήμη, οὐ πάνυ μοι δοκῶ τοῦτο εἰκάζειν, ἀλλ’ εἴπερ τι ἄλλο φαίην ἂν εἰδέναι . . . . ἓν δ’ οὖν καὶ τοῦτο ἐκείνων θείην ἂν ὧν οἶδα. Translations throughout are my own unless otherwise noted. 2  Or he contrasts gnôsis, phronêsis, sophia, noêsis, or nous with doxa, or contrasts these with pistis. In treating these groups of terms as synonyms I follow many others: see for example Crombie, 1962, vol. 2, 35; Moline 1981, 191; Snell 1924, 87 ff. I will try to show that we can very fruitfully see Plato as using varying terminology to capture a single well-unified epis­temo­ logic­al contrast; for convenience I choose ‘epistêmê’ and ‘doxa’ to label the superior and inferior kinds. (See further discussion below and in Chapter 1.2). I will note where the differences in terminology seem significant, such as at Republic 511d. 3  Plato is often credited with inventing the “classical analysis of knowledge” as (roughly) justified true belief: see for example Gettier 1963 and Armstrong 1973, 87–8.

Plato’s Epistemology: Being and Seeming. Jessica Moss, Oxford University Press (2021). © Jessica Moss. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198867401.003.0001

2 Introduction One major presupposition of this answer, sometimes made explicit, is that Plato’s epistêmê and doxa are obviously to be identified with the main players in contemporary epistemology (both folk and philosophical): knowledge and belief. Indeed our word ‘epistemology’ wears this lineage on its sleeve: it lays claim to being the study of that very thing Plato discussed, epistêmê. Another major presupposition, shared even by some who doubt that Plato’s epistemological categories should be straightforwardly identified with our knowledge and belief, is that Plato’s concerns in studying epistêmê and doxa are broadly similar to the concerns prominent in epistemology nowadays.4 He is studying epistemology as an enterprise in its own right. That is to say, his project is to make sense of the epistemically salient f­ eatures of various phenomena: for example, that some of our convictions are the product of reasoning while others are not, that some are stable in the face of argument while others are not, or that some can be transmitted to others through speech while others cannot. His goal is to carve epistemic nature at its joints. To put it apparently tautologically, his aims in doing epistemology are primarily epistemological. The main task of this book is to challenge both presuppositions, and to offer a very different account of Plato’s epistemology instead. I will argue that Plato’s epistêmê is very different from knowledge as understood by contemporary epistemology, and his doxa very different from our belief. I will not try to show that these differences entail non-identity; that question depends on how one individuates concepts. I do hope to show however that the differences are radical enough and fundamental enough that it is not fruitful to study epistêmê and doxa by beginning from the assumption that they are knowledge and belief; we should not use our 4  This assumption is very widely shared but usually implicit, testified to only by the way scholars go about assessing Plato’s project and the questions they do not ask about it. It is however sometimes made explicit. Fine argues for translating epistêmê as ‘knowledge’ on the ground that his translation “makes it clear that Plato is engaged in a familiar epistemological enterprise” (2004, 71). See also Everson, who argues that even if Plato’s epistêmê is not best conceived of as knowledge, and even though his focus is different from that of much con­tem­ por­ary epistemology, he is nonetheless doing epistemology in ways that can be mapped onto how we do it now: “The Platonic and Aristotelian concern with describing and mapping the various cognitive states a subject can be in is part of—indeed initiates—a different tradition of epistemological method from that which centres on justification. In this respect, they have more in common with what has come to be called ‘natural’ or ‘naturalistic’ epistemology, in which the epistemologist’s enterprise is part of, rather than prior to, psychology and cognitive science”; he adds that Plato (along within Aristotle) also did “normative epistemological enquiry” since, as evinced by the Republic’s Line, he was “interested not merely in how one derives one’s beliefs but also in how one structures them” (Everson 1990, 5–6).

Introduction  3 theories of knowledge and belief to guide or constrain our interpretations of epistêmê and doxa. I will also argue that to understand what epistêmê and doxa are—to make sense of how Plato fundamentally conceives them, and thus why he at­tri­ butes to them the properties he does—we have to recognize that his overarching epistemological project is very different from ours. It is not primarily driven by purely epistemological concerns. Instead, his epis­temo­ logic­al project is driven by metaphysical and ethical views: views about what there is, and how one should live. Thus the epistemological properties and distinctions that are salient to him are so primarily because of their relation to metaphysical and ethical properties and distinctions, not for purely epistemological reasons. Two caveats before I begin. First, this is a book primarily about the epis­ tem­ol­ogy of the dialogues generally characterized as belonging to Plato’s middle period: the dialogues which distinguish “Two Worlds,” a perceptible realm of ordinary things and an intelligible realm of Forms.5 It is here that the metaphysical concerns that (I shall argue) underlie Plato’s epistemology are most stark and most developed, and so it is here that the epistemological distinctions are clearest too. I will argue however that the epistemology that is at its most developed in these dialogues is at work in the Socratic dialogues too, and survives in important ways in the Theaetetus; I touch on the epistemology of these dialogues briefly throughout, and give an extended treatment in Chapters 9 and 10. Second, although I will speak throughout about epistêmê and doxa, this is not a book about the meaning of those words. I think that Plato is loose with his epistemological (as well as other vocabulary), sometimes using several words synonymously while at other times distinguishing their meanings, and often using a single word ambiguously. My project is thus not to trace his use of ‘epistêmê’ and ‘doxa’ throughout the dialogues. I instead want to show that throughout the dialogues he has a strongly unified, consistent theory about the essential features of and contrasts between the best kind of cognition, and a kind that is its salient inferior counterpart—that he is concerned with one central epistemological division, 5  The phrase ‘Two Worlds’ was traditionally used to describe this feature of Plato’s metaphysics (see for example Cornford  1941), and when I refer to these dialogues as ‘the Two Worlds dialogues’ that is how I intend it. Fine 1978 popularized the phrase ‘Two Worlds epis­ tem­ol­ogy’ to refer to the view that epistêmê is only of the intelligible realm, doxa only of the perceptible—a view that I discuss at length, under the name Distinct Objects, in Chapter  1 and beyond.

4 Introduction despite describing it with varying terminology, and despite sometimes using that same ter­min­ology to describe more marginal phenomena.6 I will not defend this approach at the outset, but instead will aim to vindicate it through my investigations.

1.  Epistêmê and doxa versus knowledge and belief Let us begin then with a look at the assumption that Plato’s epistêmê and doxa—or more precisely, the salient superior and inferior kinds in his epis­ tem­ol­ogy, which he presents under various labels—map closely onto con­ tem­por­ary notions of knowledge and belief. It is of course a major simplification to speak of the contemporary notions of knowledge and belief, since there is plenty of disagreement among con­ tem­por­ary epistemologists. Nonetheless we can easily identify certain views that are widely shared about knowledge and belief, and track whether Plato’s views converge with them or diverge. For example: almost everyone now­ adays agrees that knowledge is factive and belief is not; therefore it would constitute a major convergence if we saw Plato countenancing false doxa but refusing to countenance false epistêmê—as indeed we will. Or: most people nowadays agree that one can know that something is so without knowing why, so it would constitute a major divergence if we saw Plato insisting that epistêmê requires the ability to give an explanation—as indeed we will. Certainly there are some striking convergences that make it easy to equate Plato’s central epistemic distinction with ours. Here are some claims we see him making, with representative citations: • Epistêmê but not doxa is infallible or unerring, always true (Republic 477e, Gorgias 454d, Theaetetus 187b). • Epistêmê is more valuable than doxa (Meno 97d). • Epistêmê but not doxa confers epistemic authority (Euthyphro 5a). • Epistêmê is the aim of or norm on doxa: people who have mere doxa often think they have epistêmê, and want to have it (Republic 476d–e).

6  Compare Crombie: “A contrast between two intellectual levels is very pervasive in Plato’s writings from the Gorgias to the Laws,” but under various names; “The looseness of language is of course typically Platonic” (1962, vol. 2, 34–5).

Epistêmê and Doxa versus Knowledge and Belief  5 • Epistêmê—according to some dialogues, although not others—is built up from true doxa in combination with some extra ingredient, which is at the least analogous to contemporary epistemology’s justification, warrant, or the like: an account (logos, Theaetetus 201c–d) or a reasoning out of the explanation (Meno 98a).7 In all these ways, Plato’s epistêmê and doxa align naturally with con­tem­ por­ary epistemology’s knowledge and belief. It is then no surprise to see ‘knowledge’ and ‘belief ’ as standard translations, along with many scholarly discussions of Plato’s theory of knowledge, or of his thoughts about belief, and many claims that he is the father of epistemology and the originator of some of modern epistemology’s most important views. I suspect however that there is a deeper and more general reason behind this assimilation of Plato’s views to ours, going beyond specific similarities. This is a thought that never gets an explicit defense because it seems so obvious: Plato was clearly doing something in the neighborhood of epis­ tem­ol­ogy, and the things people think about when they are engaged in that kind of project are, obviously, knowledge and belief. Compare: Plato was clearly doing something in the neighborhood of astronomy (he had some thoughts about the things you see in the sky at night, their natures and movements and the differences between them), and the things people think about when they are engaged in that kind of project are, obviously, stars and planets and moons. Either because knowledge and belief are natural kinds, or because it is in human nature to develop concepts of them, it is obvious that they would have been the subject of Plato’s philosophical attention as much as they are now of ours. This background assumption makes it easy to fall into a kind of dogmatism: Plato must be thinking about knowledge and belief, and therefore any difficulties we encounter in fitting his views to our own must stem from oddities in his substantive theories. That Plato had various astronomical views we now think false is no reason to doubt that he was talking about anything other than the very stars and planets we study now; that he had various epistemological views we now think false should likewise be no reason to doubt that he was talking about anything other than knowledge and belief.

7  Below we will see that in other places Plato seems to reject this theory: epistêmê is not a kind of doxa; having epistêmê about something is incompatible with having doxa about it.

6 Introduction The fact is however that quite a number of Plato’s epistemological views are so hard to construe as views about knowledge and belief that one might reasonably wonder if the effort is worthwhile. Here are some other claims we see in certain contexts, again with representative citations: • Epistêmê requires reasoning out explanations (Meno 98a). • Epistêmê requires the ability to define or give an account of its object (Meno 71a–b, Phaedo 76b, Republic 534b). • Epistêmê cannot be transmitted by testimony, but requires direct acquaintance with its object (perhaps Meno 81c, 97a–b, Theaetetus 201c).8 • Doxa excludes epistêmê, rather than being an ingredient or condition of it (Republic V–VII throughout).9 • Epistêmê and doxa are “powers” of the soul, along the lines of sight or hearing (Republic 477d–e, Charmides 167e–168d). • Epistêmê and doxa are distinct powers, each with their own distinct object (Republic 477d–478e, Charmides 168a–d). • In the dialogues that distinguish an imperceptible realm of Being (the Forms) from a perceptible realm of Becoming, epistêmê is of the former and doxa of the latter (Republic 479d–e, 534a; Timaeus 27d–28a, 52a).10 When we focus on these features of epistêmê and doxa, they start to look radically different from contemporary knowledge and belief. Should we then question the identification? Or is it so obviously correct as to be beyond doubt? One need only step back from recent analytic Plato scholarship to see that it is not. In fact, the identification of Plato’s epistêmê and doxa with knowledge and belief, standard as it has become, is only a recent development, and has already faced forceful criticism.

8  It is the one who has been to Larissa himself who has epistêmê of the road (Meno 97a–b); before birth the soul has epistêmê of things in virtue of the fact that it “saw” them (Meno 81c). The idea shows up also in Plato’s denials that epistêmê can be transmitted through testimony, even the reliable testimony of someone who has epistêmê themselves: conventional teaching cannot give us epistêmê, which can only be got through recollection of the things we directly encountered (Meno 81c–86b); even a jury “justly persuaded” of the truth about some crime will not thereby get epistêmê, which is available only to someone who was there and saw what happened (Theaetetus 201b). 9 At Meno 98a and Theaetetus 201c–d Plato seems to reject this claim; I discuss this tension in Chapter 7. 10  The way I have put these last two claims is controversial. I will defend it at length in the remainder of the book.

Epistêmê and Doxa versus Knowledge and Belief  7 If we look back before the 1960s, we find that a very common English translation of epistêmê is ‘Science.’11 This translation picks up on a philosophical tradition that begins with the widespread use of ‘epistêmê’ in Plato’s time to denote what we would call sciences: specialized bodies of knowledge held by experts in particular areas.12 Aristotle elevated this use into a very specific theory: his epistêmai are deductively valid systems grounded in necessary truths about natures or essences.13 The Aristotelian notion gets preserved and developed in the medievals’ Scientia, and via this route in the early moderns’ Science, or Knowledge: a grasp of the deep, ul­tim­ate truths, which are ­necessary and essential.14 When scholars in the nineteenth or early twentieth centuries translated Plato’s ‘epistêmê’ as ‘Science’ they were taking him to belong to this tradition—indeed, presumably, to have founded it.15 As for doxa, older interpreters tended to translate not as ‘belief ’ but as ‘opinion,’ or sometimes ‘seeming.’ Moreover, there is a tradition dating back to ancient times on which doxa is something much narrower than belief as regarded nowadays: something very closely tied to perception, sometimes described as assent to perceptual appearance, sometimes described as empirical cognition.16 Recent scholarship presents alternatives as well. Despite the widespread tendency to treat epistêmê as knowledge, a number of scholars have argued that it should be construed as something else: as “logically certain knowledge,”17 or as expertise,18 or as understanding—a deep, systematic, explanatory grasp.19 Despite the almost universal equation of doxa with belief, a few recent accounts have argued for other interpretations: as

11 See for example Bosanquet  1895, Jowett  1908, Taylor  1926, Shorey  1930, and Hackforth 1945. 12  LSJ (Liddell and Scott, rev. 1940) cites Republic 477b ff. along with the Posterior Analytics as loci for the meaning “scientific knowledge, science” (s.v. epistêmê, A.II.2). 13  Thus only some of what we call sciences, and of what Aristotle in looser moods calls epistêmê (e.g. at Nicomachean Ethics 1138b27) are Aristotelian epistêmai in this strict sense: mathematics counts; medicine does not. 14  For citations and defense of this reading of Spinoza, Leibniz, and Descartes, and a brief comment on the continuity with Aristotle’s epistêmê, see Carriero 2013. 15  For a recent defense of this line, see Wolterstorff 1996, 220–1: “the medievals were at one with Plato in their understanding of epistêmê” because in the Republic epistêmê is a grasp of “what is fully real. . . the necessary, eternal, immutable.” 16  Crombie 1962, Cornford 1941, Gulley 1962, Sprute 1962; in Ancient times see especially Alcinous and Proclus, quoted and discussed in Chapter 8. 17 Vlastos 1981, 1985. 18  Woodruff 1990. 19 See Moravcsik  1979, Annas  1981, Burnyeat  1980, Nehamas  1985, Benson  2000, Schwab 2015, 2016.

8 Introduction inherently deficient cognition,20 or cognition of particular tokens rather than universal types.21 I will discuss these interpretations in more detail in Chapters 5 and 8. I think there is much that they get right. Most generally, they are focusing appropriately on certain features of Plato’s epistemology, features that cast serious doubt on the identification of its central concepts with con­tem­por­ ary knowledge and belief.

2.  The plan Abandoning that identification in favor of any alternative, however, will raise major questions. There are of course questions about the interpretative adequacy of the alternatives: for example, epistêmê is much more demanding than understanding as nowadays conceived, and restricted to a much narrower domain, so that we might raise the same kind of worries about this interpretation as about the interpretation of epistêmê as knowledge. More fundamentally, there are questions about why Plato would choose epistêmê and doxa as the star players in his epistemology if they are not in fact knowledge and belief. We know lots of reasons to center epistemology around the study of knowledge and belief; what are the reasons for doing it some other way? Why would Science, for example, or understanding, be so salient to Plato? Why would he choose to devote so much attention to defining one of these? And why would he think that the relevant contrast kind is opinion, or seeming, or empirical cognition? Most generally, once we take seriously the possibility that Plato’s central epistemological concepts are radically different from ours, we are faced with the task of reassessing his whole project. If he is not studying the same phenomena that we are, perhaps that is because he is not asking the same questions. If so, then the evolution of epistemology is not after all much like that of astronomy (different views of the same objects). A closer parallel would be the evolution of ethics, according to a common interpretation. It is often held that Ancient ethics asks a different set of questions from those we ask nowadays, focusing not on moral rightness and moral requirements, but 20  Vogt 2012, although she translates ‘doxa’ as belief and does not in my view go far enough in distinguishing the two. See also Moss and Schwab 2019. 21 Rowett 2018.

The plan  9 instead on the notion of happiness. A theory developed to address the ­question “How should one live?” will be badly misunderstood if it is taken to be focused on the question “What makes an action right?”; perhaps Plato’s epistemology is similarly misunderstood when we look at it through the lens of current concerns. If so, we need to figure out what his actual concerns are. Is he analyzing the epistemological concepts current in his day? Articulating the epistemic ideal, and the corresponding deficiency?22 Introducing new concepts that serve his non-epistemological philosophical purposes in some way? If Plato is not doing epistemology the way we do it nowadays, then we need to figure out what he is doing when he does epistemology, and what his epis­tem­ ol­ogy is about. My aim in this book is to answer these questions—to interpret Plato’s whole epistemological project, as well as its central concepts of epistêmê and doxa—by taking as a starting point what is arguably the most radical difference between his epistemology and ours. I have in mind the last claim in the list of differences above: epistêmê is of Being, while doxa is of something distinct from and inferior to Being. This may seem a perverse place to start. The claim comes from an argument in Republic V that is famously difficult, riddled with ambiguities, and the subject of numerous conflicting interpretations; indeed, on some interpretations it is misleading even to state the claim as I have done.23 Surely then, one might think, whatever claim Plato is making here is best read in the light of independently established views about his epistemology, rather than used as a foundation. I will try to show however that there are major textual and philosophical gains to be made by taking this claim as a starting point. Taking “epistêmê is of Being, doxa is of something inferior” as bedrock characterizations, we can construct interpretations of epistêmê and doxa that make sense of all their peculiarities: interpretations that integrate the features Plato attributes to epistêmê and doxa across many dialogues, accommodating their similarities to contemporary knowledge and belief as well as their differences. We can also construct an account of Plato’s entire

22  For this interpretation of Aristotle’s epistemology, see Pasnau 2013. 23  Smith (2000,  2012, 2019) argues that while epistêmê is specially correlated with being, and doxa with something inferior, the relation is not the relation of being of or about; cf. Szaif 2007. Fine (1978, 1990) has an interpretation on which the formulation I have given is misleading, since epistêmê’s objects (true propositions) are not wholly distinct from doxa’s (true and false propositions); cf. Gosling 1968. I discuss these interpretations in further detail in Chapter 1.

10 Introduction epistemological project which shows it to be not a muddled or nascent ­version of our own, but something radically different, very much in keeping with his overall philosophical concerns, and compelling in its own right. Here is a brief summary of the claims I will make. First, Plato’s epistemological projects are motivated by, and must be understood in the context of, his central ethical and metaphysical views. These are views that can be found in inchoate forms in the earlier dialogues, and survive in complicated ways in the late ones, but are most robust, developed, and explicit in the middle dialogues, and find their most dramatic expression in the Republic’s allegory of the Cave.24 Namely: • There is a crucial metaphysical distinction between two levels of ­reality: genuine Being on the one hand, and something inferior and derivative on the other, which can be characterized among other ways as the realm of what seems. • There is a crucial ethical distinction stemming from this metaphysical one: to be in contact with Being is to be living well, while to rest content with the inferior level of what seems is to hinder oneself even from aspiring to live well. If one comes with this metaphysical and ethical background to epis­temo­ logic­al investigations, the distinction one will find most salient and im­port­ ant will be that between cognitive contact with what Is and cognitive contact with what seems. And that is precisely how we should understand the fundamental distinction between Plato’s superior and inferior cognitive kinds. Republic V thus gives us not a muddle or mystery, but an explicit statement of Plato’s central epistemological doctrine. The main claims of this doctrine are these: • Epistêmê and doxa are each essentially to be understood as cognition of a certain kind of object, since each is adapted to grasp its special object and indeed inherits its character from its object.25 (Chapter 2)

24  I adopt the standard ordering of Plato’s works, but am not committed to it: for my purposes, as will become clear below, the major division is between dialogues which embrace a full-blown two-level ontology, distinguishing intelligible Forms from sensible particulars, and dialogues which do not. 25  In my formulations here I gloss over the distinction between the powers (dunameis) of epistêmê and doxa, and their activities; for discussion see especially Chapter 2.

The plan  11 • Epistêmê is in its essence the grasp of being, what is. This Plato takes to be a truism, which he develops and inflates with his metaphysics: the beings are ontologically privileged items, the real, which in the Two Worlds dialogues are the Forms. This explains both the features that make epistêmê resemble contemporary knowledge and those that make it more resemble Science and understanding. Epistêmê is best understood as a deep grasp of ultimate reality. (Chapters 3–5) • Doxa is in its essence a response to what seems. This too Plato takes to be a truism, which he inflates with a metaphysical view: the things that seem are ontologically inferior items, namely images and appearances, a class which in the Two Worlds dialogues includes the entire perceptible realm of Becoming. This explains both the features that make doxa resemble contemporary belief and those that make it look like empirical cognition. Doxa is best understood as cognition that stays at the level of readily accessible appearances, and therefore ignores the imperceptible entities that are, on Plato’s view, truly real. (Chapters 6–8) In sum, just as on Plato’s view the world contains both colors and sounds, and we are equipped with special powers of grasping each, so too on Plato’s view the world contains both being and something inferior, and we are equipped with special powers of grasping each. Epistêmê is the power by which we understand what is, doxa the power by which we form impressions of the ontologically inferior things which seem to be. This turns out to explain all the features of doxa and epistêmê, all the contrasts between them, and the supreme value of epistêmê. My account of Plato’s epistemology draws very much on others’ work: many of the claims I make have been presented already in some version. For example, the idea that Plato’s epistemology is firmly grounded in his metaphysics is stressed by Gerson (2009) and White (1992); my characterization of epistêmê has much in common with what we find in Moline (1981), and also in various interpretations of epistêmê as explanation-grounded understanding (e.g. Nehamas 1985, Schwab 2016); my characterization of doxa is in large part similar to what we find in Sprute (1962) and Gulley (1962); my overall picture is strongly indebted to Cornford (especially 1941). In many cases, however, these authors reach their conclusions through arguments with which I disagree, or through insufficient argument, and so I wish to offer new foundations. Moreover, these interpretations are still hotly contested, or treated as marginal, or in some cases evidently outright forgotten. I aim therefore to offer them new and more systematic defenses, and also to

12 Introduction bolster them by showing their place in an overall interpretation of Plato’s epistemology. I also aim to draw out their significance more sharply—in particular, to show just how radical a difference they entail between Plato’s epistemology and today’s. My account will show that Plato’s central epistemological categories are different enough from ours that it is dangerous to use our own epistemological intuitions and theories in interpreting his. Perhaps one might, after a careful comparison, conclude that Plato is indeed getting at the same phenomena that we track nowadays, albeit by a very different method; that should however be the conclusion of a study of his epis­tem­ol­ogy, and not a premise. (For brief attempts, see Chapters 5.4 and 8.4.) My account will also show that Plato’s epistemological project is very different from the projects epistemologists undertake nowadays. If Plato’s epis­ temo­logic­al categories are different in important ways from ours this should not be surprising, because his epistemological inquiry is driven by questions we would not consider purely and properly epistemological. Instead, it is motivated by metaphysical concerns, and ultimately by ethical ones. Plato’s epistemology is part of his overall inquiry into how one should live.

1

Plato’s “Two Worlds” Epistemology If we cannot simply assume that epistêmê and doxa are knowledge and belief, how should we go about determining their natures? How should we investigate what Plato’s epistemology is about? It would be nice if we could do ordinary language philosophy, determining what the words meant in Plato’s time and taking those meanings as his central notions. Indeed some interpreters take this approach as if it were unproblematic.1 There is certainly a good deal to be said for looking to contemporary language for guidance, and I will do so in developing my own accounts of epistêmê and doxa; indeed, I will eventually argue that Plato’s epistêmê and doxa are theory-laden, metaphysically inflated versions of the conceptions current in his day. As a core strategy, however, beginning with contemporary usage is unpromising. First, different authors in Plato’s time use these terms in different ways in different contexts, so much so that it is an interpretative task in itself to determine what the terms meant in their mouths, and whether each term had a single standard meaning or was systematically ambiguous.2 Second, Plato is notoriously willing to twist ordinary language almost beyond popular recognition: consider for example his treatment of justice (dikaiosunê) in the Republic, or of wanting (to boulesthai) in the Gorgias 1  See Barnes, countering Burnyeat’s suggestion that Plato’s epistêmê is not ordinary know­ ledge but instead understanding: epistasthai, epistêmê, and cognates “are not philosophical neologisms; they occur frequently in Greek literature from Homer onwards, and they are there correctly translated by ‘know ’ and its cognates. . . Both Plato and Aristotle talk of epistêmê ­without special qualification or apology; they give no indication that they intend the term in a novel or restricted sense; we are obliged to conclude that they thought they were investigating the ordinary concept of knowledge” (Barnes 1980: 204–5); cf. Fine 2004, 70. For direct arguments against these claims about ordinary Greek usage, see Schwab 2015. 2  Pace Barnes’ and Fine’s claims about epistêmê, quoted in the previous note. A look at the LSJ entry is instructive: as the main heading they offer “acquaintance with a matter, understanding, skill, as in archery” (citing Sophocles Philoctetes 1057, where the claim that someone “has this epistêmê” is naturally translated as “is skilled in this art”; cf. their passages from Thucydides and Lysias, as well as Plato). “Generally, knowledge” comes in as a second heading, with far more citations for its subheading, “scientific knowledge.” Plato’s Epistemology: Being and Seeming. Jessica Moss, Oxford University Press (2021). © Jessica Moss. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198867401.003.0002

14 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology (466e–468d). Whether he means literally to redefine certain words, or ­simply to present surprising theories about their application, ordinary usage is often a poor guide to Plato’s. There is another strategy for understanding Plato’s epistemology, implicit in much work on the subject: begin with a list of all the various notions in our own epistemological repertoire—knowledge and belief, but also understanding, scientific understanding, a priori knowledge, expertise, opinion, perception, empirical cognition, and so on—and determine which ones are the best matches for epistêmê and doxa as Plato characterizes these. This strategy is inspired, presumably, by the assumption that these are the basic kinds out there to be studied (whether because they are natural kinds, or universal human constructs), and therefore that Plato must have been talking about some of them. The strategy has its strengths, but is plagued by vagueness: given that Plato’s kinds clearly have some features in common with various of these, and others diverging from them, how do we decide which commonalities and divergences are decisive, and which marginal? It is also subject to charges of anachronism: why should we assume that the concepts central to Plato’s epistemology are ones central to ours, or even ones that we acknowledge at all? The parallel strategy for understanding other areas of Plato’s philosophy might well fail: there is room for serious doubt about whether the kalon, a concept central to Plato’s view of virtue, has any counterpart in modern ethics (the fine, beautiful, noble, ad­mir­able?); most modern psychologists would deny that they work with any concept much resembling Plato’s notion of the thumoeides (spirited part of the soul). Thus we should be open to the idea that the only way to identify Plato’s core cognitive concepts is to look for unifying features within his own characterizations: to bracket our assumptions about what he is trying to track, and look only at his actual descriptions. But this would seem to be a dizzying task. Plato makes so many different claims about epistêmê and doxa in so many different contexts, many of them varied or even conflicting. How do we know which give us the core concept, as opposed to marginal or optional details, or even if there are any core concepts there to be found? I want to show that there is no need for special inventiveness, nor for despair. For alongside his various claims and characterizations, Plato offers us very clear and explicit instructions about how to define and understand cognitive kinds. I have in mind the instructions he gives in the course of Republic V’s famous argument about the difference between epistêmê and doxa. Here Socrates identifies both epistêmê and doxa as powers (dunameis—one might

Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology  15 also translate “abilities,” “capacities,” “faculties”), and presents a general strategy for defining powers: In a power I look toward this thing only: what it is over and what it accomplishes [eph’ hôi te esti kai ho apergazetai], and in that way I call each of these a power.3 And what is set over the same thing and accomplishes the same thing I call the same power, while what is over something different and accomplishes something different I call a different power  (Republic 477d)

Epistêmê and doxa are powers of the soul (477e). A power is distinguished from others only by “what it is over and what it accomplishes.” If you want to know what makes one power different from another, then, this is where you should look. Is this meant as a mere heuristic guide to recognizing powers? Or might it be something stronger, a claim about what it is to be a given power? If so, Plato would be providing a manual for answering our questions about epistêmê and doxa: to understand what each of these is, look to what it is over and what it accomplishes; that is what yields the essential characterization. Of course we would need to figure out what he means by ‘over,’ what he means by ‘accomplishes,’ and how to fill in the values of each for epistêmê and for doxa. We would also need to understand what it means for epistêmê and  doxa to be powers, and how this characterization relates to the more familiar (to us) notion of cognitive kinds as attitudes or states. At least, however, we would have a method that tells us how to proceed. Consider the instructions for understanding powers that Aristotle provides in his work on the soul. Aristotle divides the soul into a number of things he calls powers (dunameis), such as the nutritive, perceiving and thinking powers. In a famous passage of De Anima II.4, he explains how each power is essentially defined: If one must say what each of these [powers] is, for example what is the thinking or the perceiving or the nutritive [power], it must first be said what thinking is and what perceiving is. For the activities and the actions are prior in account to the powers. And if this is so, and prior still to these the cor­res­ pond­ing objects must be studied, one must first define these, for the same reason [i.e. that they are prior in account], for example about nourishment and the perceptible and the thinkable.  (Aristotle, De Anima 415a16–22) 3  Or “in that way I name each power” (ταύτῃ ἑκάστην αὐτῶν δύναμιν ἐκάλεσα).

16 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology The echoes of Plato are striking.4 Powers are defined by two things. First, their activities and actions: this is already reminiscent of Plato’s “what they accomplish,” and elsewhere Aristotle calls these erga, accomplishments or functions (402b9–16), closer still. Second, their ontological correlates, the things out there in the world on which they do their work—like Plato’s “what they are over.” As we will see in Chapter 2, Aristotle elsewhere expli­ cit­ly applies this principle to cognitive powers: not just thinking, as mentioned here, but also the powers of epistêmê and doxa (Nicomachean Ethics 1139a6–12 with 1140b26–28, quoted in Chapter 2.2). Aristotle’s claim in De Anima goes further than what we find explicit in Republic V, in two ways. First, he puts the ultimate work onto the objects rather than sharing it between objects and activities: the objects are “prior in account” to the activities. Second, the work he puts on the objects (and, derivatively, on the activities) is explicitly definitional. The power of sight, for example, is what it is because the visible is what it is. Thus Aristotle’s theory of psychological powers is fundamentally objects-based: each psychological power is ultimately defined by its object. Plato says none of this explicitly in Republic V. Looking back at the argument, however, it is very easy to see him as closely anticipating Aristotle’s argument; the differences are superficial or inconclusive. I will defend this interpretation in greater detail in Chapter 2, but here is a brief defense. First, although he identifies powers in part by “what they accomplish,” his description of the accomplishments is wholly uninformative: he simply uses the verbal forms of each noun, as if to say that in each case the power of Φ-ing has as its accomplishment the activity of Φ-ing;5 this implies that, as in Aristotle, it is ultimately the objects that do the work. Confirming this, he goes on to state twice that a difference in powers entails a difference in objects.6 Second, although he does not explicitly state that his individuating criteria are also definitional, a look at his treatment of powers elsewhere, and especially of cognitive powers, strongly suggests that they are (see Chapter  2). Perhaps then this is a case of Plato leaving implicit or 4 They have not however been noted much in discussions of the Republic’s argument. Johansen (2012, 94) notes the parallel, and interprets it in a way very congenial to what I will argue here: “Aristotle’s understanding of dunamis is inspired by Socrates’ account. Like Socrates, he thinks that in order to determine what a dunamis is we need to determine what it is about.” The account he goes on to give of how Aristotle understands the priority of objects is very similar to what I will attribute to Plato in Chapter 2. 5  Doxa is the power by which we doxazein (477e), epistêmê that by which we gnônai (cognate with ‘gnôsis,’ a word this passage uses interchangeably with ‘epistêmê’) (478a). 6  478a–b, quoted in Chapter 2.1.

Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology  17 undetermined something that Aristotle makes explicit: powers are not only individuated but in fact defined by their objects. The powers argument does mention one other difference: epistêmê is infallible (anamartêton), doxa fallible (477e). It is hard to reconcile this claim with the earlier claim that powers can only be distinguished by their objects and accomplishments; perhaps the idea is that these are features of their accomplishments: doxa accomplishes fallibly, or accomplishes something fallible, by contrast with epistêmê (Cornford 1941, comment ad loc). One might think that Plato means here to be identifying the fundamental, essence-giving feature of each power. Notably however it is Glaucon who mentions these features, and they are treated as evidence that the two p ­ owers are different, where this is at least compatible with their being explained by the essential difference rather than constituting the essential difference. In the next chapters I will argue that this is indeed Plato’s view: doxa and epistêmê are each ultimately defined by their objects; because it is of Being, epistêmê is infallible; because it is of the ontologically inferior, doxa is fallible. If the Republic’s powers argument really anticipates Aristotle’s objectsbased psychology, then we would have in this argument the key to his epis­ tem­ol­ogy. Cognitive kinds are defined by their ontological correlates. The most revealing characterization of epistêmê is that it is the power set over its particular object, here in Republic V identified as “what is” (478a). The most revealing characterization of doxa is that it is the power set over its particular object, here identified as “what is between being and not being” (478d–e). The project of this book is to conduct an experiment: the experiment of taking these characterizations as starting points in understanding Plato’s epistemology. I will develop the idea that the nature of Plato’s cognitive kinds is determined by their objects: indeed, the nature not just of the cognitive powers, but also of the (more familiar to us) occurrent states or attitudes, which we should understand as accomplishments or exercises of the powers. I will develop accounts of the objects of both epistêmê and doxa, and from there will develop accounts of epistêmê and doxa themselves. I do not claim that there is conclusive evidence that Plato means us to proceed this way, but I will argue that there is enough evidence to make the experiment well worth undertaking (Chapters  1 and  2). If it can produce compelling results with textual support and philosophical payoff—as I hope to show that it can (Chapters 3–8)—we should take it to be vindicated. There is however a serious objection to undertaking this experiment at all. The proposed objects-based interpretation of the Republic’s powers argument rests on a reading of that argument that has recently become

18 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology highly contentious. The past half-century has seen extensive debate over the interpretation of Republic 476e–480a, with nearly every aspect of the argument subject to multiple interpretations.7 Many deny that Plato really means to individuate doxa and epistêmê by ontological correlates that serve as their objects. Indeed, many regard such an interpretation as so thoroughly problematic as to be a total non-starter. And if Plato is not even individuating cognitive kinds by their objects, how could he mean to be defining them that way?8 Before I begin my positive account of Plato’s epis­ tem­ol­ogy, then, I must show that the approach is viable. The task of the present chapter is to show that it is admissible to read Plato as holding that cognitive powers are individuated by their objects— indeed, to shift the burden of proof onto those who reject that reading. With the ground thus cleared for the stronger interpretation on which ­powers are defined by their objects, the task of the next chapter is to provide positive arguments that this is precisely what we should expect Plato to hold, given his approach to powers in general, and to cognition in particular.

1.  The Two Worlds debate Let us begin with a brief overview of the Republic’s powers argument. Socrates wants to show that the ideal city is possible only when the rulers are philosophers, because philosophers alone have epistêmê, while many who think they have epistêmê, such as “sight-lovers” (aesthetes), in fact have only doxa. In order to establish that philosophers alone have epistêmê, he begins with the following claims: (1) Epistêmê and doxa are distinct powers (dunameis) (477d–e).9 (2) Distinct powers are “over” (epi) distinct things (478a). (3) Epistêmê is over what is (478a). (4) Doxa is over what is between being and not being (478d–e). So much is explicit. As to the interpretation, however, there is a raging controversy—particularly centering on the questions of what Plato means 7  See among many others Gosling  1968, Fine  1978 and 1990, Annas  1981, Stokes  1992, Brown  1994, Gonzalez 1996, Baltzly  1997, Butler  2007, Smith  2000, 2012, Szaif  2007, Taylor 2008, Kamtekar 2009, Boylu 2011, Vogt 2012, Harte 2018. 8  For more on the connection between individuating by objects and defining by objects, see the end of Section 2, and Chapter 2. 9  The evidence for their being distinct is that epistêmê is infallible, doxa fallible (477e).

The Two Worlds debate  19 by ‘over,’ what he means by ‘what is,’ and what he means by ‘what is between being and not-being.’ Here is one interpretation. ‘What is’ refers to the very things Socrates will shortly identify as the object of epistêmê, namely the Forms (479e). ‘What is between being and not-being’ refers to the very things Socrates will shortly identify as the object of doxa, namely the many beautiful things, large things, and so on (479a–e), i.e. the perceptible (to horaton, 509d). The “over” relation is the relation of a cognitive power to the objects out in the world onto which that power directs the mind—in other words, something like the subject matter with which that power is concerned. The rest of the argument should thus be understood as follows: (5) The many perceptible things, including beautiful sights, are between being and not-being (479c, e).10 (6) The Forms are (479e). (7) Therefore only those who attend to Forms—that is, philosophers— have epistêmê; those who attend to the perceptible realm have doxa (479e–480a). If this interpretation of the powers argument is correct, then Plato is individuating cognitive powers by their ontological correlates. Epistêmê is exclusively exercised on Forms, and doxa exclusively exercised on ordinary perceptibles. One can no more have epistêmê of a perceptible, or doxa of a Form, than one can see a sound or hear a color. What I have just outlined is often called the “Two Worlds” interpretation of Plato’s epistemology, but the name does not get to the heart of the issue. Nearly everyone agrees that according to the Republic there are two worlds, as symbolized so clearly by the Line and Cave images: the perceptible realm of ordinary objects, and the intelligible realm of Forms. What is at issue between this interpretation and its rivals is whether each world is the sole and exclusive object of its own correlated cognitive power—whether

10  The end of the argument makes this explicit: those who attend to sights and sounds have only doxa, because they are in touch only with what is between being and not-being (479d–e). Confusion has resulted from Plato’s reference to “the conventions [nomima]” that roll about between being and not-being (479d). Nomima is often translated as ‘belief ’ (see for example Shorey 1930, Fine 1990), with the odd result that Plato is now identifying as doxa’s objects— what is between being and not-being—doxa itself. In the sequel to the argument, however, Plato uses ‘nomima’ again, to mean the images of Forms that philosopher-rulers instill in the city (484c). Most charitably, then, nomima in the powers argument too are images of Forms, the objects of doxa, rather than doxai themselves.

20 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology cognitive powers have distinct objects.11 I will therefore refer to the ­interpretation instead as the Distinct Objects interpretation. (I use ‘Two Worlds’ to refer to the metaphysical thesis that there are two distinct realms; when I speak of Two Worlds dialogues I mean those that put forth that thesis.) The Distinct Objects interpretation is the traditional interpretation of Plato’s epistemology: as I show in Section  2, it was standard and largely unquestioned for more than two millennia. In the past half-century, however, it has come to be so widely doubted as to seem to many to be simply off the table. First came complaints that Plato should not have held it (for example Cross and Woozley  1964), then a flood of new interpretations, starting with Gosling 1968 and Fine 1978, on which he in fact did not hold it. Many now think that Plato cannot mean to separate the objects of epistêmê and doxa so sharply; indeed such a view is regarded as “outrageous” (Baltzly 1997, 240), “deeply paradoxical, at best” (Smith 2012, 57). Far more charitable to think that Plato had something subtler in mind. For example: - Each power has a privileged relation to its associated objects, but not an exclusive one. For example: each power can apprehend its own objects directly but can also apprehend the other’s objects with assistance from another power (Kamtekar,  2009, 142–3); doxa is “naturally adapted” to perceptibles but can in a deficient way grasp Forms (Vogt 2012, 55); each power is “normatively tasked” for its own objects but can with the aid of those objects cognize other things (Harte 2018). - Each power has an exclusive relation to its associated objects, but these objects serve only as material for the power, and not as subject matter, what particular accomplishments of doxa or epistêmê are about; thus there can be overlap in the latter (what I will call the Content Overlap view: see Smith 2000, 2012, and 2019; compare Szaif 2007).12 - The claim of the powers argument is not at all that epistêmê and doxa have different ontological correlates like Forms and perceptibles, but instead that they are related to different but overlapping sets of

11  Moreover, as I will argue below, one can hold that epistêmê and doxa have distinct objects without holding that those objects occupy separate realms: they might be distinct aspects or properties of the same entities, as colors and sounds are of ordinary physical objects. 12  There are important differences between the views in these works; I will focus on their common trait of distinguishing between the objects which a power is “over” and the objects about which one can have doxa or epistêmê.

The Two Worlds debate  21 prop­os­itions: epistêmê to the set of true propositions, doxa to the set of true and false propositions (Fine 1978, 1990).

We can refer to these and many related interpretations as Overlap readings, since their common claim is that there is some overlap between the objects of doxa and those of epistêmê.13 Overlap interpretations have been the norm in analytic Plato scholarship since Fine’s influential paper (although recent years have seen a few compelling criticisms of individual Overlap interpretations, and a few intriguing developments of Distinct Objects views in their place).14 They were almost unheard of before it. Why are they now so widely accepted? Certainly there are text-based motivations for them. If philosophers’ fitness to rule rests on their having epistêmê, surely epistêmê must be ap­plic­ able to the perceptible world, telling us which human laws and actions are just.15 Indeed, Socrates says almost explicitly that philosophers have epistêmê of such things: when philosophers return from theoretical study to the Cave of political life they will “know [gnôsesthe] each image, what it is and what it is an image of ” (Republic 520c; cf. 506a).16 And while the point is less often noted, Plato also characterizes wisdom (sophia), the virtue that makes an individual able to rule their own individual life well, as a kind of epistêmê (Republic 443e); if epistêmê has no practical application this too is

13  The interpretation defended by Smith and Szaif is on one sense of ‘objects’ a Distinct Objects interpretation, on another an Overlap interpretation. 14  Arguing extensively against Fine see especially Gonzalez 1996; defending either a complete Distinct Objects reading or (more commonly) only the restriction of epistêmê to Forms, see also Vlastos  1981, Kahn 1996, Gerson  2003, 2009, Sedley  2007, Carpenter  2012–13, Woolf 2013, and Schwab 2016. 15 On the Distinct Objects interpretation the philosophers live in “a different cognitive world” from those they rule, and hence “knowledge turns out to be irrelevant to the problems that inspired the search for knowledge in the first place” (Annas 1981: 194); “the ‘two-worlds’ theory of Plato’s epistemology manages to destroy the very argument Plato takes himself to be advancing . . . that philosophers would be better rulers” (Smith 2000, 153–4). 16  The verb in both passages is gignôskein, which the powers argument used as correlate with epistêmê: see especially the characterization of the objects of knowledge as to gnôston at 478b, quoted above. For extensive arguments that the relevance of epistêmê to ruling undermines the Distinct Objects reading see especially Fine (1990) and Smith (2000). I have not seen those who object to the Distinct Objects reading cite as evidence against it what might at first seem more decisive: various passages in which Plato refers to epistêmê in some particular material domain, e.g. house building (Republic 438d) or horse riding (Republic 601c–d). I suspect it seems even to opponents of the Distinct Objects reading that in these passages Plato is using epistêmê loosely or broadly, as equivalent to what he would elsewhere call technê, rather than in the strict sense intended in Book  V.  (Compare Aristotle’s occasional broad use of epistêmê, for example at Nicomachean Ethics 1138b27, to cover what he elsewhere calls technê by sharp contrast with epistêmê.)

22 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology paradoxical. Conversely, Socrates and his interlocutors evidently have many doxai about the Forms, since they have thoughts about Forms but deny having epistêmê;17 indeed, Socrates says almost explicitly that he has doxai about the Form of the Good (Republic 506c).18 Finally, there is the broader text-based argument that in other dialogues—the Meno and Theaetetus— Plato holds an Overlap view: if a true doxa can become epistêmê by being tied down with an account of the explanation (Meno 98a), or if a true doxa together with a logos amounts to epistêmê (Theaetetus 201c–d), then a fortiori, the argument goes, doxa and epistêmê can share objects.19 These are serious challenges that any Distinct Objects interpretation must face, and I will address them below, arguing that they can in fact be met. (A brief preview: epistêmê informs our judgments about the per­cep­ tible realm without directly applying to it, the way that in some areas ideal theory informs but does not directly apply to practice (Chapter 4.5); meanwhile, thoughts about Forms that fall short of epistêmê are not doxa but instead something between the two, like what Plato calls dianoia (Chapter 7.6). The Meno can be read as embracing a Distinct Objects epis­ tem­ol­ogy without a Two Worlds metaphysics, so that the objects of the ­powers are closely related (Chapter 9.3). The Theaetetus is aporetic, in part to highlight the problems with abandoning a Distinct Objects view (Chapter 10).) Here, however, I want to focus on a different kind of question. Why were these challenges for the Distinct Objects interpretation only noticed so recently? And why are they now so widely taken as decisive, mandating creative readings of the passages that correlate cognitions with objects, rather than showing that the passages which suggest these challenges stand in need of creative readings themselves? Proponents of the Distinct Objects interpretation from years past are usually simply silent on the passages that Overlappers find so significant, or else give readings consistent with the Distinct Objects interpretation without seeming to notice any problem.20 17  See especially Vogt 2012. 18 Adeimantus asks Socrates to relate his own dogma (etymologically closely related to doxa) about the good (Republic 506b); Socrates refuses, not saying that he can have no such thing, but instead implying that he does and that they are deficient: “Haven’t you perceived that doxai without epistêmê are all shameful? The best of them are blind” (506c), and hence there is no point talking about “what seems to me” about the Good (506e). I discuss this passage in more detail in Chapter 7.6. 19  The sharing of objects is particularly explicit at Theaetetus 208e: αὐτοῦ ἐπιστήμων γεγονὼς ἔσται οὗ πρότερον ἦν δοξαστής. 20 For example, a look at major English-language commentaries (Adam 1902, Cornford 1941, Bosanquet 1895, Jowett and Campbell 1894) shows straightforward Distinct

The Two Worlds debate  23 When they do notice passages that seem to conflict with Distinct Objects, they find creative ways to read those passages on which the conflict disappears.21 Why is the situation so different now? What has changed in the philosophical and interpretative landscape? Here is a very natural hypothesis: the objections to the Distinct Objects interpretation stem from reading Plato through the lens of twentiethcentury epistemology. The main motivation for doubting that Plato held a Distinct Objects epistemology is the thought that such a view is philo­soph­ ic­al­ly hopeless, and this thought rests on the assumption that in doing epis­ tem­ol­ogy, Plato is doing more or less what epistemologists do nowadays. In particular, it rests on the assumption that epistêmê and doxa are more or less just like what we now call knowledge and belief—an assumption that often surfaces explicitly, but is operative through much work on the subject. When Overlappers insist that it must be possible to have epistêmê of per­ cep­tibles, they are often obviously thinking of epistêmê as the sort of thing philosophers once thought well analyzed as justified true belief. That state is very promiscuous in its subject matter; it can certainly be had about per­cep­ tible things.22 Hence for example Fine’s complaint that it would be absurd for Plato to deny epistêmê of perceptibles, for it would follow that “no one can know even such mundane facts as that they’re now seeing a tomato, or sitting at a table” (1990, 86). When Overlappers insist that it must be possible to have doxa of Forms, they are thinking of doxa as belief: either generic belief, the sort of thing philosophers now analyze as “taking to be true”; or as belief that falls short

Objects in­ter­pret­ations of Republic 477d–80a, and no comments indicating any worries for that interpretation at 506c or 520c. 21  For example: when Neoplatonist commentators on the Phaedo notice an allusion to doxa of Forms (Phaedo 66b–67b, discussed below) they take this as evidence that the word ‘doxa’ is ambiguous between something that arises from perception and is confined to perceptibles—at issue, presumably, in all the discussions that imply Distinct Objects—and something else, derived from thought, at issue in the present passage (see the commentaries by Damascius and Olympiodorus, discussed below and in Chapter 7.6). When traditional interpreters notice that the Theaetetus implies the possibility of epistêmê of perceptibles, they take this to show that Plato did not in fact endorse this analysis: see for example Cornford 1935, or the interpreters referred to by the Anonymous Commentator in the late first century BCE as holding that the Theaetetus shows “what epistêmê’s objects are not” (viz., perceptibles): see discussion in Sedley 1996. 22  Of course we can only know true facts or propositions, but we can know such truths about all sorts of objects—e.g. about unicorns we can know that they do not exist, and about contingently existing objects we can know that they exist contingently (see Introduction). Also: many skeptics deny knowledge of perceptibles, but it is very difficult indeed to read Plato as holding that kind of view, and no Distinct Objects interpreters to my knowledge do. (I will say more about this in the discussion of true doxa, in Chapter 7.1.)

24 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology of knowledge, sometimes called ‘opinion.’ Beliefs of both kinds can in ­principle be had about any subject matter at all. Generic belief is widely taken to be a necessary condition of knowledge, and opinion can share its subject matter with knowledge. Hence for example Vogt’s objection to the trad­ition­al Distinct Objects reading on which there is no doxa of the Form of the Good: From the point of view of contemporary ethics, and from the point of view of ordinary talk about our ethical lives, it seems obvious that we have beliefs about the good . . . Starting from such beliefs, we might try to formulate a theoretical account . . . It would seem that an ethical theory according to which one cannot do this must be misguided. Surprisingly, Plato scholars have been content with an interpretation of the Republic according to which Plato cannot allow for beliefs about the good [viz., an interpretation on which there is no doxa about the Form of the Good]. (Vogt 2012, 51)

When Overlappers deny that epistêmê and doxa are distinguished by their objects they are thinking of cognitive attitudes as topic-neutral attitudes, distinguished only by degree of justification, or method of acquisition, or other purely epistemological features. They are motivated by the kind of thought we find in Cross and Woozley’s complaint that Plato was misled by his own analogies in the Republic’s powers argument: [I]f, without any preconceived theories, we consider knowledge and belief, which are the two powers with which Plato is especially concerned here . . . [we see] that the difference lies in the way of apprehending, and there is no necessary difference in the objects apprehended.  (Cross and Woozley 1964, 164)23 23 Cross and Woozley are not Overlappers: they think that Plato did hold the Distinct Objects view, but that he was wrong to hold it. Their assumption that epistêmê and doxa are knowledge and belief is clearly the motive for this disapproval: “Plato draws a distinction between knowledge and belief, and. . . between two different sets of objects corresponding to these different states of mind. . . We ought now to ask ourselves whether there is in fact a distinction to be drawn between knowledge and belief, and if there is, whether Plato’s way of representing the distinction is satisfactory;” their answer to the second question is that it is not, because knowledge and belief can overlap in their objects (1964, 166). Compare Armstrong, who thinks that in the Republic Plato advances a Distinct Objects view, which as he puts it “contests, that the one state of affairs, for instance the roundness of the earth, can be the object of the distinct cognitive attitudes,” and then argues that the falsity of this view—apparent on the assumption that the attitudes are knowledge and belief—is “one of those obvious facts which we should appeal to in the course of testing philosophical theses and arguments rather than allow philosophical theses and arguments to cast doubt upon” (Armstrong 1973, 141).

The Two Worlds debate  25 The thought is frequently echoed; for example: Now even before looking at the [powers] argument we find it prima facie odd that an object of belief can never be an object of knowledge. For a start, it violates our intuition that the same thing can be first believed and then known, that coming to know is not changing the subject. (Annas 1981, 194) [On the traditional reading of the powers argument], knowledge and belief cannot have the same objects. But this seems puzzling . . . [I]ntuitively, it is possible for one person to have knowledge of the very same thing that another person believes; indeed, in modern epistemological discussions it is assumed that knowledge entails belief so that whatever a person knows that same person will also believe.  (Harte 2018, 142)

In brief, the assumptions underlying many Overlap readings are that Plato’s epistemological categories are the same as ours, that his epistemology is more or less like ours, and in particular that he, like us, recognized the obvious fact that cognitive kinds are simply not the sort of things to be individuated by their objects. The task of the present chapter is to undermine these assumptions, in part by showing that they are very recent indeed, and hence should be suspected of anachronism, and in part by showing how natural it is to read Plato himself as being innocent of them—as simply laying out a Distinct Objects epistemology without concern to accommodate any of the worries such an epistemology would face now. I am not trying to show that the Distinct Objects reading must be correct, but instead to show that it is far from a non-starter, and should be put back firmly on the table. Indeed, I think the arguments I offer here should render the Distinct Objects interpretation the default, to be abandoned only if we cannot meet the textual and philosophical objections alleged against it. In the following chapters I will argue that we can. A final note before I begin. My purpose in defending the Distinct Objects reading is to clear the way for an objects-based account of Plato’s epis­tem­­ ology; there are however objects-based accounts consistent with various Overlap interpretations, and indeed several such interpretations explicitly construe cognitive kinds as tailored to or defined in terms of their objects. For example, on accounts like Harte’s, Kamtekar’s, and Vogt’s, epistêmê can be defined by a relation to Forms even though doxa can be had of Forms too, just as for example a pruning knife is defined by a relation to pruning

26 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology even though other knives can be used to prune (Republic 353a).24 On a Content Overlap account like Smith’s or Szaif ’s, epistêmê as a power can be defined by its relation to Forms, even though its exercises or applications can be about perceptibles, and vice versa for doxa. Indeed, it is only Fine’s propositional reading of the powers argument that is sharply at odds with an objects-based interpretation. Why not then defend or at least leave open a moderate Overlap reading, insisting only that epistêmê and doxa each bear some special relation to an ontological correlate, and proceed to develop an account of Plato’s epistemology from there? I have a number of reasons for experimenting with a radical Distinct Objects reading. First, I believe, and hope to convince the reader, that this is very much the most obvious way to read Plato, and also the way that he was read for about two millennia. We simply never see him nor his older interpreters working to draw the kind of distinctions on which moderate Overlap readings rely, nor showing signs of noticing problems with the starker view. Second, while there could indeed be versions of an objects-based epis­tem­­ ology consistent with some overlap, I will argue in Chapter  2 that both Plato’s characterization of how powers in general are related to objects, and also his characterization of how cognitive kinds share significant properties with their objects, point us toward an objects-based epistemology on which the objects of each cognitive kind are sharply distinct. Third, I will try to show in the remainder of the book that reading Plato this way yields compelling accounts of both epistêmê and doxa, ones not only consistent with the texts but also with Plato’s wider philosophical projects. In short, I think the only reason to prefer a moderate Overlap reading to a stark Distinct Objects one is the thought that the latter cannot be made to work— but I hope to show that it can.

2. The prima facie case for Distinct Objects Until recently there was no Two Worlds debate: scholars simply assumed that Plato held the Distinct Objects view, both in the Republic and related dialogues (see Section 3 for evidence). Why was this reading so widespread?

24  Harte (2018) cites this passage as background for the powers argument; Vogt explicitly argues that in saying that each power is “by nature” (pephuke) over its objects (Republic 477b), Plato means that “it is the nature of knowledge and belief to be structured toward their objects” (Vogt 2012, 63).

The prima facie case for Distinct Objects  27 I think the answer is clear: it is the natural, simple, straightforward reading of Plato’s discussions of epistêmê and doxa throughout the Republic and in related dialogues as well. I cannot hope to establish that claim decisively, and I will not try: so much has been written in recent years questioning the Distinct Objects reading, and so many strategies found for re-interpreting the texts that seem most to support it, that I am sure further strategies can be found to undermine whatever further evidence I provide. Nonetheless it may be helpful to remind ourselves just how obviously right the Distinct Objects in­ter­pret­ ation can seem when we are not already convinced that it must be wrong. To be clear about my goal: I want to show that there is copious evidence that in the Two Worlds dialogues—those that separate Forms from per­cep­tibles—Plato is working with an epistemological view on which the crucial divide tracks that metaphysical divide: the superior kind of cognition is restricted to Forms, and the inferior kind is restricted to perceptibles. For simplicity’s sake, and to follow Plato’s most prominent usage, I will ­generally refer to the Form-confined kind of cognition as epistêmê, and the per­cep­tibles-confined kind as doxa; as I mentioned in the Introduction, however, this is a simplification, and in two ways. First, as we will see shortly, Plato often uses other terminology: he sometimes uses ‘phronêsis,’ ‘gnôsis,’ ‘noêsis’ or ‘noûs’ to refer to cognition which he describes as c­ onfined to Forms; he sometimes uses ‘pistis’ to refer to cognition which he describes as confined to perceptibles. Second, he sometimes uses ‘epistêmê’ and ‘doxa’ in ways that do not fit this picture: for example, the housebuilder has epistêmê of building houses (Republic 438d); the philosopher has doxa that truth is to be found only in the intelligible realm (Phaedo 66b–67b). Although I will argue that these latter are non-standard uses which are nonetheless explained by Plato’s core uses, as I said in the Introduction my thesis is not a thesis about Plato’s use of the words ‘epistêmê’ and ‘doxa.’25 It is instead a thesis about his overall epistemological project: I want to show that he has a pervasive project of distinguishing superior cognition from inferior by correlating the superior kind with ontologically superior objects, and the in­fer­ior kind with ontologically inferior objects. I hope readers of Plato will recognize that he is often loose enough with his terminology that inconsistencies in vocabulary do not belie the existence an overall unified view; my aim is to show that he does have such a view. Now to the textual evidence. 25  I am thus taking a very different approach from what we see in for example Fine 2016, or Lyons 1963.

28 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology First, there is the much-discussed passage from Republic V with which we began, where Plato argues that all powers (dunameis) are distinguished by what they are set over and what they do (477c–d).26 His idea must be that these are interdependent criteria, for he twice stresses that a difference in powers entails a difference in objects: [W]e clearly agree that epistêmê is different from doxa?—Different.—So each is by nature over [epi] something different, since each has the power for something different?—Necessarily . . . . If different powers are by nature over different things, and both of these are powers, doxa and epistêmê, and ­different from one another, as we say, from these things it follows that the same thing cannot be gnôston and doxaston [the object of gnôsis, i.e. epistêmê, and the object of doxa]. (Republic 477e–478b, emphases added)

Why does Plato ignore the possibility that two powers could be set over the same object, distinguished only by what they do to it?27 The simplest ex­plan­ation is that he conceives of a power as the power to do some activity φ to some type of object f where φ-ing can only be done to fs. In other words, it would appear that Plato is individuating powers of the soul by their objects: there is a one-to-one correspondence between objects and powers. I will develop and defend this reading in detail in Chapter 2, arguing that this is precisely what he is doing; for now I want simply to point out that that is the simple reading of the text, accommodating Plato’s repeated claim that a difference in powers necessarily entails a difference in objects. Overlappers find plenty of ways to read the powers argument that loosen the correlation between object and power. For example, to say that a power is over (epi) an object is to say that it operates at its best or by nature on this object, not that it can operate only on this object.28 Or, as Fine argues, the things that doxa and epistêmê turn out to be over—what is, and what is between being and not-being—are not wholly distinct: Plato means that epistêmê is over the set of true propositions, doxa over the set of true and false propositions. These readings all depend on subtle interpretations of special features of the powers argument: of the over (epi) relation, or of the phrase ‘what is.’ 26 Compare Phaedrus 270d: to define anything we must see what power it is has—“to do what in relation to [pros] what, or to undergo what by the agency of what?” 27 To take Fine’s example, as butchery and husbandry do different things to the same objects, animals (1990, 5). 28  For example Kamtekar 2009, Vogt 2012, Harte 2018.

The prima facie case for Distinct Objects  29 There is much to be said about whether or not these interpretations are vi­able on their own terms, as interpretations of this specific argument: I can see the force of some of the going interpretations of epi, while I am convinced (with what is perhaps a majority these days) that the propositional in­ter­pret­ation of ‘what is’ is strongly in tension with the text.29 I will not enter into the debate about this particular passage at more length here. I discuss the passage in more detail in Chapter 2, but for now I want to point out something crucial that discussions of it often ignore. Even if the Overlapper persuades us of an interpretation of this passage, her work is not done: although the debate has focused almost exclusively on this argument, it is only one among many pieces of strong prima facie evidence for the Distinct Objects thesis. Within the Republic, the powers argument is only the beginning: as Plato elaborates his ontological and epistemological divisions through the famous passages on the Sun, Line, and Cave, he makes repeated claims that cor­rel­ ate distinct cognitive kinds with distinct objects—claims not easily tackled by the particular strategies Overlappers have developed to explain the ­powers argument. First, when Plato first returns to the topic of levels of reality and of cognition, in the simile of the Sun, he makes what looks like an unqualified correlation between powers and objects:30 Whenever [that part of the soul by which we think] is fixed on that on which truth and being shine [the Forms], it understands and knows it and appears to have intelligence,31 but whenever it [is fixed on] that which is mixed with darkness, that which comes to be and passes away, it has doxa and is weaksighted, shifting its doxai back and forth.32  (508d, em­phasis added) 29  For extensive arguments see Gonzalez 1996. I will not repeat his arguments here; to my mind the most decisive is that throughout the argument, and especially toward its end (479c–e), there is a clear identification of what is with the Forms, and of what is between being and ­not-being with perceptibles. 30  He introduces this passage with a claim that is to serve as an analogy for epistêmê and doxa: when our eyes fix on things illumined by the sun we see clearly, but when they turn to things in darkness we do not. It is natural to think that here we have one set of objects, not two: the very same trees, for example, can be the object of good vision (analogous to epistêmê) or bad (analogous to doxa). But the passage I quote shows that in the epistemic case Plato clearly intends two distinct sets of objects. The Cave allegory yields a cleaner parallel: one set of objects (the statues and shadows) is by nature always in the dark, and it is these that symbolize the object of doxa. 31  ἐνόησέν τε καὶ ἔγνω. The related nouns (noêsis, gnôsis, gnômê) show up as apparent syn­ onyms for epistêmê throughout the middle books (see citations below); in our Republic V passage, as we saw, Plato uses gnôston as the objective correlate of epistêmê. 32  δοξάζει τε καὶ ἀμβλυώττει ἄνω καὶ κάτω τὰς δόξας μεταβάλλον.

30 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology Strategies for deflating the ‘over’ of Republic V as describing a mere norm or primary function will founder on the ‘whenevers’ we find here: one will need a bold new strategy for denying that Plato is saying what he seems to be saying, namely that every cognition in which the mind is directed toward Forms is an instance of epistêmê, and every cognition in which the mind is directed toward perceptibles an instance of doxa. Of course some such strategy may be found: one might suggest for example that the “fixed on” relation is a very strong one; if the soul is merely attending to Forms without being fixed on them, it may have doxa, and mutatis mutandis for epistêmê of perceptibles. My point is not that any such strategies are hopeless, but that Overlappers will need to employ a hodgepodge of them to tackle different texts—to the point where their strategy becomes quite strained. Proposition-based strategies like Fine’s will founder on this text too. Fine interprets Republic V’s “over” talk as being about the relation of cognitions to propositions, and thus as making no claims about distinct subject matters, but the present passage clearly claims that epistêmê is the result of attention to Forms, doxa the result of attention to things that come to be and pass away—perceptibles. Whether or not Plato conceived of doxa and epistêmê as propositional attitudes, the claim here seems to be that they have distinct objects precisely in the sense of ontological correlates, not propositions. Indeed all the passages I cite below name the relata of doxa and epistêmê as perceptibles and intelligibles, or as Becoming (genesis) and Being (where it is clear, as we will see, that this is a distinction between two different types of object: things that change and things that remain the same). I will therefore set aside the propositional reading from here on, influential as it has been in this debate. Next comes the famous simile of the Line, which distinguishes sharply between two realms, the visible and the intelligible (noêton) (509d), and then refers back to these as the objects of doxa and gnôsis (the doxaston and the gnôston, 510a). This seems to assume a straightforward identity claim: what can be seen and what can be the object of doxa are one and the same; what can be the object of epistêmê is identical with what can be accessed by intellect instead of by perception. Indeed, the Line strongly reinforces the impression that Plato held a Distinct Objects view by compounding the distinctions, for now we have four levels of reality, and a different cognitive state over (epi again) each one. There are two subsections of the doxaston, each presided over by its own

The prima facie case for Distinct Objects  31 species of doxa, and two subsections of the gnôston, each presided over by its own species of epistêmê.33 In the Cave allegory the correlation is even stronger: at each of four stages the ascending prisoner achieves a higher cognitive state because she is attending to a higher class of object (see especially 515d). Cognitive states, it seems, are determined by their objects, as we saw at 508d: if you are focused on perceptibles, things in the Cave, you have doxa; if you are focused on intelligibles, things outside of the Cave, you have epistêmê. At the end of the discussion Plato sums up the correlations with a new formula: Doxa is about [peri] becoming, noêsis34 is about being. (Republic 534a).

Overlap strategies for handling the ‘over’ (epi) of Republic V will now have to extend to the ‘about’ (peri) of Book VII, but the Cave allegory makes it particularly natural to take the correlation to be strict. Along the way, moreover, Plato has made several statements about the highest cognitive state in particular that seem to confine it very starkly to intelligibles: [the many beautifuls, many goods, etc.] are seen, but not understood [noeisthai], while the Forms in turn are understood, but not seen. (507b–c, emphasis added) . . . if anyone tries to learn something about perceptibles, by gaping up or blinking down, I deny that he would ever learn—for such things admit of no epistêmê.35 (Republic 529b–c, emphasis added)36 33  “Over [epi] the four sections take there to be four conditions [pathêmata] arising in the soul: noêsis over the highest, dianoia over the second; render pistis for the third, and over the last one eikasia” (511d–e). Recapping these divisions at 534a Plato refers to eikasia and pistis as both being (species of) doxa. He never explicitly calls noêsis or dianoia species of epistêmê (or gnôsis), but at 533e–4a, in what seems to be a blatant shift of terminology, calls the very top section epistêmê instead of noêsis, and says that both epistêmê and dianoia are (species of) noêsis. 34  Noêsis here names the highest stage of thought; see previous note. 35  ἐάν τέ τις . . . τῶν αἰσθητῶν τι ἐπιχειρῇ μανθάνειν, οὔτε μάθειν ἄν ποτέ φημι αὐτόν ἐπιστήμην γὰρ οὐδὲν ἔχειν τῶν τοιούτων… 36  Schwab (2016) draws attention to this passage as powerful evidence for his case that epistêmê is restricted to Forms; I return to the passage in Chapter 4.4, arguing that the ensuing lines both confirm this reading and provide Plato’s rationale for the view. Readings have however been proposed on which these lines make a weaker claim: it is impossible to gain epistêmê by focusing solely on perceptibles, but if you have already studied the Forms then you can come to have epistêmê of the perceptibles. (See Rowe’s (2012) comment ad loc).

32 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology These look like outright denials that epistêmê of perceptibles is possible— not mere denials that it is the norm, or natural, or best. Looking outside the Republic, we find that other dialogues with Two Worlds metaphysics—dialogues that distinguish a realm of Being from a realm of Becoming—also seem to correlate each ontological realm with a distinct cognitive power, again without any overt qualification or apology. The Timaeus is a particularly clear case. Here as in the Republic Plato distinguishes “that which always is” from “that which is always becoming,” and adds: The former is grasped by noêsis with reason [logos], always being the same; the latter in turn is the object of doxa [doxaston] through doxa with unreasoned perception, becoming and passing away, but never really being (Timaeus 27d–28a)

Later in the dialogue we get a distinction between Forms: which it falls to noêsis to investigate, and the other kind . . . per­ cep­ tible . . . grasped by doxa with perception.  (Timaeus 52a)

These claims doubtless could be interpreted as describing mere norms, but Plato mentions no exceptions; his evident interest is in correlating distinct cognitive kinds with distinct objects.37 Starker still is this: Whenever logos arises that is about [peri] the perceptible, and the circle of the different going straight proclaims it to the whole soul, doxai and pisteis38 arise stable and true; but whenever in turn logos is concerned with the calculating39 and the circle of the same, circling smoothly, reveals these things, nous and epistêmê are necessarily accomplished. (Timaeus 37b–c, emphases added)

37 Indeed this last passage compounds the impression that powers are correlated with objects by adding a third ontological kind and assigning a third power to grasp it: place or the receptacle is a different genos, and thus cannot be grasped by either noêsis or doxa; instead it is “apprehended by a kind of bastard reasoning with non-perception, and is scarcely an object of pistis” (52b). 38  Plural of pistis. 39  λογιστικόν. This must here mean the object of reasoning, rather than the faculty (see discussion in Cornford 1937, 95 note 3): in other words, the intelligible, identified in the two passages quoted previously as Being, i.e. the Forms.

The prima facie case for Distinct Objects  33 Cognition of intelligibles is by nature different from cognition of per­cep­ tibles—it proceeds through a different “circle”—and it always yields a different cognitive state. Then there is the evidence of the Phaedo. Here as in Republic V Plato contrasts stable Forms with shifty perceptible particulars; here too he uses Beauty as his exemplar (Phaedo 78d–e). And here too he distinguishes two modes of cognition corresponding to two ontological realms: These [particulars] you could touch and see and perceive with the other senses, while those [beings] that remain always the same it is not possible to grasp in any other way than with the reasoning of thought40…So should we posit two species of things that are, the one visible, the other invisible? (Phaedo 79a–b)41

This looks to be a statement of a Distinct Objects view. Here the contrast is not between epistêmê and doxa, but instead between reasoned thought and perception; as we read on, however, it becomes clear that the two distinctions align. Here is a striking echo of the Republic’s Sun analogy (508d, quoted above): [T]he soul, whenever it makes use of the body for investigating something, either through seeing or through hearing or through some other sense . . . is dragged by the body toward the things that are never the same, and itself wanders and is confused and is dizzy as if drunk, because it is having contact with things of that sort . . . But whenever it investigates itself by itself, it passes toward what is pure and always being and deathless and always the same, and since it is akin to it, it always is with it, whenever it is itself by itself and is able to, and it has ceased its wandering and remains always in the same state, because it is having contact with things of that sort.42 And this affection of it is called wisdom [phronêsis]. (Phaedo 79c–d)

As at Republic 508d, whenever the soul attends toward stable Forms the result is a stable psychic state (here called phronêsis, but with obvious af­fi n­ ities to the Republic’s epistêmê or noêsis or nous: cognition of the Forms).

40  τῷ τῆς διανοίας λογισμῷ. 41  Socrates goes on to argue that there is a further similarity: soul is like the divine in being a ruler, body like the perceptible in being ruled (80a). 42  ἅτε τοιούτων ἐφαπτομένη.

34 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology Whenever it attends instead to shifty perceptibles, investigating things through the body, i.e. through perception (79c), the result is a confused and shifting psychic state. That state is not here named, but shortly below Plato distinguishes again between the condition of someone who pays attention to perceptibles and that of someone who does not, now characterizing the former as doxa. The soul of a person who experiences much bodily pleasure and pain in visible things (ta horata, 83c): has doxa that the very things that the body declares true are true…[and] shares its doxai43 . . . [While by contrast the soul of the philosopher] follows reasoning and is always with it, studying the true and the divine and the adoxaston and nourished by that.  (Phaedo 83d–84a)

Attending to perceptibles yields doxa, and can never yield a higher cognitive state because perceptibles confuse the soul. Attending to Forms yields phronêsis, and can never yield doxa because Forms are adoxaston—not possible objects of doxa.44 This is a very stark and explicit Distinct Objects view. Moreover, it is put forth in passages with clear echoes of Republic V, encouraging us to think that that is Plato’s view there too. Epistêmê is cognition of Forms, doxa of perceptibles. (Note that the Phaedo’s emphasis on the role of perception in doxa is echoed in the other Two Worlds dialogues: in the Republic doxa is introduced as the mindset of “lovers of sights and sounds,” and Plato later refers to the lower half of the Line interchangeably as the doxaston and the visible (509d–510a); in the Timaeus, as we just saw, the lower ontological order is grasped by “doxa with perception” (Timaeus 52a).) In the Phaedrus, the “true kind of epistêmê” is about “the colorless, shapeless, and intangible being that really is,” namely the Forms (247c).45 In the Philebus, the crafts concerned with things that come to be and pass away rely on doxa (59a), while true epistêmê and nous are about (peri) “what is and what really is and is always the same” (58a; cf. 59c–d).46 I have presented all this not as decisive evidence for the Distinct Objects reading, but as a reminder of why it seemed so natural for so long. Looking 43  δοξάζουσαν ταῦτα ἀληθῆ εἶναι ἅπερ ἂν καὶ τὸ σῶμα φῇ. ἐκ γὰρ τοῦ ὁμοδοξεῖν τῷ σώματι… 44  For this interpretation see for example Gallop’s commentary ad loc (Gallop 1975). One could of course argue that Plato means the claim about Forms to be more restricted: they are not merely objects of doxa, but also of epistêmê, or they are not objects of doxa for the philosopher (see Fine 2016). 45  ἡ γὰρ ἀχφώματός τε καὶ ἀσχήματιστος καὶ ἀναφὴς οὐσία ὄντως οὖσα . . . περὶ ἣν τὸ τῆς ἀληθοῦς ἐπιστήμης γένος. 46  For a more nuanced treatment of the Philebus’ epistemic categories see Chapter 2.3.

A brief history of the Distinct Objects interpretation  35 at Republic V’s powers argument, at the rest of the Republic, and at other dialogues that distinguish two ontological realms, we find Plato consistently drawing one-to-one correspondences between cognitive kinds and ontological kinds, with the higher cognitive kind confined to intelligibles, the lower to perceptibles. The evidence is strong and copious. As we will now see, it was for over two millennia taken as unambiguous.

3.  A brief history of the Distinct Objects interpretation Suppose that you are learning about Plato’s epistemology in the fourth century bce, by reading his student Aristotle. Here is what you will hear about epistêmê: Plato . . . having in his youth become familiar with Cratylus and with the Heraclitean doctrines that all perceptibles are always flowing and there is no epistêmê about them,47 continued to hold these doctrines in later years. (Metaphysics 987a32–b1)48

Aristotle evidently thinks that Plato holds both an extreme metaphysical view: perceptibles are in radical, Heraclitean flux.49 He also thinks that Plato holds on that basis an extreme epistemological view: there is no epistêmê about perceptibles. Whether or not Aristotle is correct in these attributions, it is clear that he made them: according to Aristotle, Plato countenanced no epistêmê of perceptibles. Nor does Aristotle show any perplexity as to how Plato could have held such a view; he simply asserts that he does. (He makes no parallel statement about Plato’s doxa, but we will see in Section 4 that he himself endorses a version of a Distinct Objects epistemology on which doxa is confined to its own realm, and that when he does so he claims to be saying what “everyone believes.”) 47  ἁπάντων τῶν αἰσθητῶν ἀεὶ ῥεόντων καὶ ἐπιτσήμης περὶ αὐτῶν οὐκ οὔσης. 48 Compare Metaphysics 1078b12–17: proponents of the Forms posited them in the first place because they believed that perceptibles were “always flowing,” and thus needed to find some other object for epistêmê, since “epistêmê cannot be of the flowing [οὐ γὰρ εἶναι τῶν ρεόντων ἐπιστήμην].” 49  Plato discusses, but does not endorse, views about the extreme instability of the per­cep­ tible world in the Cratylus (439c–440d) and Theaetetus (152d–160c); Aristotle may also have in mind Plato’s contrasts in the Republic and other Two Worlds dialogues between the changing, contradictory nature of perceptibles and the permanence and stability of Forms (see for ex­ample Republic 479a–b, 524a, 529d–530b, Phaedo 74b–c and 79c–d, Symposium 210e–211b, and Philebus 59a–b).

36 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology Might Aristotle have intended a subtle claim compatible with an Overlap reading—for example, that there is epistêmê of perceptibles in an indirect or derivative or atypical way, or that while epistêmê as a power takes only Forms as inputs, exercises of epistêmê can be about perceptibles? Certainly we see him making no such qualifications. Moreover, the argument he appeals to very strongly suggests a stark, unqualified account: perceptible things are so radically unstable that no thoughts about them will have the kind of abiding truth required for epistêmê. I will not try to offer a comprehensive account of Plato scholarship over the ensuing two millennia, but a brief look at a few influential interpreters will confirm this pattern: commentators repeatedly attribute to Plato a stark Distinct Objects view, without raising any of the concerns that motivate Overlap readings. Suppose you are learning about Plato’s epistemology in Roman times, from Cicero’s description of Plato’s Academic followers. You will hear that the Forms are the province of scientia (the standard Latin translation of epistêmê), while perceptibles are opinabile, the object of opinio (the standard Latin translation of doxa).50 No doubts or qualifications, just a simple report. Or suppose that you are learning about Plato’s epistemology the way ­people did for many centuries, by reading the second century ce “Handbook of Platonism” (Didaskalikos), attributed to Alcinous.51 You would get an unqualified Distinct Objects claim: [Human logos (reason)] has two elements, one concerned with [peri] intelligibles, and the other with perceptibles, of which the one concerned with intelligibles is epistêmê and epistemonic logos, and the one concerned with perceptibles is doxastic [logos] and doxa . . . Of epistêmê . . . and doxa . . . the principles [archai] are thought [noêsis] and perception. (Didaskalikos, 4.2–3; cf. 4.7–8)

Again there are no qualifications or subtleties. Perhaps ‘concerned with’ (peri) could be read consistently with an Overlap account, but we see the 50  All perceptibles, which are in constant flux, “they called objects of opinio [opinabilem]. Scientia however they thought existed nowhere except in the notions and reasoning of the mind” (Cicero, Academica I.31–2); just above we were told that the mind (mens), by contrasts with senses, “discerns that which is always simple and uniform and such as it. This they called Form…” (I.30). Hence this is a Distinct Objects view: opinio is of the perceptible, Scientia of the Forms. 51  The work was particularly popular from the Byzantine period up until the nineteenth century; for discussion of its influence, and authorship, see Dillon 1993, preface and introduction.

A brief history of the Distinct Objects interpretation  37 author making no efforts to give such an account, nor raising any concerns that might motivate one. Moreover, the author gives an account of doxa that seems constructed to confine it to perceptibles. That doxa has its principle or origin (archê) in perception suggests that all doxai are derived from perception, and so ­cannot be of purely intelligible things. In the next lines, we get a definition of doxa as the “interweaving of memory and perception” (4.5). This is a ­definition we find nowhere explicit in Plato, but it has echoes of the Philebus: doxa “comes on each occasion from memory and perception” (Philebus 38b). In the Philebus, memory has earlier been defined as the preservation of perception (34a), and so is itself only of perceptibles. Moreover, the Didaskalikos supports the definition with an example based on the wax block discussion in the Theaetetus (193c), where the memory in question is clearly derived from perception.52 According to the Didaskalikos’ def­i n­ition, then, every episode of doxa is derived from an episode of perception. Doxa is, in effect, perception-based cognition, and hence there is no doxa of Forms. (Some will protest that a doxa about perceptible Fness is, given Plato’s metaphysics, ultimately about the Form of F; I address this view in Chapter 7.) Suppose you turned instead to another middle Platonist, Plutarch. You would learn that Plato, following Parmenides, distinguished an im­per­cep­ tible realm from a perceptible, and made the first the object of noêsis (noêton), the second the object of doxa: And Plato (and Socrates even earlier) understood that nature has one elem­ent that is doxaston, and has another that is noêton. And the doxaston is unstable and wandering. . .  (Adversus Colotem 13)

A few lines below the doxaston is identified with Parmenides’ aisthêton, per­ cep­tible realm. Once again, there are no qualifications or concerns.53

52  When we perceive an object which we remember from past perception, “we put together the previous memory with the second sensory perception, and we say within ourselves, for instance, ‘Ah, Socrates!’…and it is this that is termed ‘doxa’” (Didaskalikos 4.5). The Didaskalikos shows no sign of concern about other passages in the Theaetetus which imply that one can have doxa of imperceptibles such as numbers (195e–196a): the author is perhaps simply ignoring these examples, or somehow interpreting them in a way consistent with this thoroughgoing empiricism about doxa. 53  Plutarch strongly implies a similar view in his interpretation of Plato’s doctrine of recollection (Fr. 215, Sandbach): epistêmê comes from pre-birth encounters with Forms, while what sense-experience gives us is something inferior (see Scott  1987). For a detailed account on

38 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology Or suppose you turned for illumination to the Neoplatonists. Far from raising any problems for the Distinct Objects interpretation, they seem to embrace it with gusto, correlating a proliferation of cognitive kinds each with its own realm, in ways that would seem to leave no room for Overlap.54 Proclus interprets Plato as holding that there are various kinds of gnôsis, cognition, each “defined by their objects”55 (In Timaeum 2.249.8–9, comment ad Timaeus 27d–28a, with reference to the Republic; cf. 2.254.24–27). Indeed, each kind of cognition is not only correlated with its own type of object, but somehow stems from it: The things [pragmata] are of two kinds, what is and what has become, and the cognitions are of two kinds, noêsis and doxa . . . For from where else do cognitions come, but from the objects of cognition?56 (In Timaeum 2.339.14–17)

Moreover, each kind of cognition is similar in character to its cor­res­pond­ ing objects: For we say that everywhere the like is cognized by the like: for obviously by perception the perceptible [is cognized], and by doxa the object of doxa [doxaston], by dianoia the object of dianoia [dianoêton], and by nous the object of nous [noêton].57 (Theologica Platonica, I.15.17–20)

I will argue in Chapter 2 that Proclus is right to find in Plato the doctrine that like is cognized by like, and furthermore that, given Plato’s metaphysics, the view entails Distinct Objects. A cognitive kind that cognizes eternally self-same intelligibles must be similar to them, and therefore unable to cognize anything dissimilar to them such as the shifting objects of doxa—and vice versa.

which Plutarch takes himself to be following Plato in denying noêsis of the perceptible realm, see Boys-Stones 1997. See Section 4 for discussion of Plutarch’s own Distinct Objects view. 54  With one qualification: Plotinus may hold that dianoia as well as noêsis is of Forms. I consider the special case of dianoia in Chapter 7.6. 55  διορίζων τὰς γνώςεις τοῖς γνωστοῖς. 56  πόθεν γὰρ ἀλλαχόθεν αἱ γνώσεις, ἢ ἀπὸ τῶν γνωστῶν. 57  Τῷ γὰρ ὁμοίῳ πανταχοῦ φαμὲν τὰ ὅμοια γινώσκεσθαι· τῇ μὲν αἰσθήσει δηλαδὴ τὸ αἰσθητό ν, τῇ δὲ δόξῃ τὸ δοξαστόν, τῇ δὲ διανοίᾳ τὸ διανοητόν, τῷ δὲ νῷ τὸ νοητόν. On the difference between doxasta and aisthêta, see main text below.

A brief history of the Distinct Objects interpretation  39 Proclus also makes it explicit that each cognitive power is activated only when operating on its particular set of objects, with no overlap. There is a general cognitive (kritikê) power, namely logos, which: when it directs itself toward the contemplation of intelligibles uses both itself and noêsis . . . and when judging the objects of doxa also [in addition to itself] sets in motion doxa . . .58 (In Timaeum 2.255.3–12)

Moreover, like Alcinous but even more starkly, Proclus offers very specific accounts of each cognitive kind, accounts which entail that they are by nature restricted each to their own realm. Nous is direct, non-discursive, intuitive grasp of intelligible objects (see for example In Timaeum 2.243.18–22). Doxa meanwhile is explicitly is defined as “cognition [gnôsis] of perceptibles” (In Timaeum 2.249.2–3 comment ad Timaeus 28a). Its function is to discern the whole object underlying various proper perceptibles: in Proclus’ example, while sight says that a perceived object is red, smell that it is fragrant, and so on, doxa is the power (dunamis) by which we connect these proper perceptibles and say what the perceptible object is—an apple— “and for this reason Plato has called the perceptible the object of doxa ­[doxaston]” (2.249.13–27).59 This seems simply to rule out any doxa of intelligibles: doxa operates only on objects we can perceive. (I return to this characterization of doxa in Chapter 8.) Clearly this is not an interpretation designed to leave room for Overlap of any kind.60 Much the same views are to be found a millennium onwards in the Renaissance reviver of Platonism. Ficino argues that on Plato’s view Scientia

58  ὁ λόγος . . . ἐπὶ μὲν τὴν τῶν νοητῶν θέαν στελλόμενος ἑαυτῷ τε χρῆται καὶ τῇ νοήσει . . . τὰ δὲ δοξαστὰ κρίνων κινεῖ καὶ τὴν δόξαν. Logos uses both itself and dianoia to discern the “inter­ medi­ates,” itself and phantasia to discern the phantasta, and itself and perception to discern perceptibles. 59  For discussion of Proclus’ view of doxa see Lautner 2002, which in passing attributes to Proclus a thoroughly Distinct Objects reading of Plato, as well as a Distinct Objects epis­tem­­ ology of his own. 60  Might the Neoplatonists have in mind a Content Overlap reading of the kind proposed by Smith or Szaif? Answering that question would require a very careful study, but my in­clin­ ation is to say no. Reading their detailed, thorough, inquisitive commentaries on passages that trouble modern readers, we simply see no signs of these concerns. See for example Proclus’ lengthy commentary on Timaeus 27d–28a, a passage I quoted above where Plato assigns Being to nous and Becoming to doxa (In Timaeum 2.240–64). Proclus raises questions about whether or not Plato means to be offering definitions of being and becoming; he also takes the occasion to state the Neoplatonist doctrine of intellect’s identity with its objects and sense’s identity with its objects; but he says nothing at all elaborating let alone qualifying the relation between epis­ temo­logic­al kinds and ontological.

40 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology (the standard Latin translation for epistêmê) can be had only of “things which are always the same, and are in the same way,” namely “the highest principles of things, and the eternal causes of all things.”61 Indeed, this follows from its very nature: What then is Scientia? The comprehension of divine things by certain reason [divinarum rerum certa ratione compraehensio.] (Summary of Plato’s Theaetetus, in Divini Platonis Opera Omnia, 93).

Opinio (the standard Latin translation for doxa), meanwhile, is confined to perceptible things—it is “the general comprehension” (notionem commune) of the perceptible by contrast with the intelligible, and again this is due to its very nature: as on Proclus’ view, its role is “to judge [iudicare] the things which the common sense perceives through the five organs, not only what they are like, but what they are” (ibid, 92). The Neoplatonic interpretation of Plato kept its hold for centuries, and with it a consistent embrace of Distinct Objects. Let us jump ahead then to another major era of Plato scholarship, the extensive German scholarship of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Here we do find attention to one worry that motivates some modern Overlappers: how to reconcile the Distinct Objects view of the middle dialogues with the Meno’s implication that doxa and epistêmê share objects.62 Nonetheless, we also find widespread commitment to the view that those middle dialogues do indeed embrace Distinct Objects. Here for example is Zeller, commenting on the Timaeus: [Plato agrees with Parmenides that] only Being as such can be known . . .Therefore what is thought must be as distinctly separated from what is represented [dem Vorgestellten – i.e. the doxaston] as thinking is from representing [der Vorstellung – i.e. doxa].  (Zeller 1920, 152)

Finally, suppose you are learning about Plato by reading the great flowering of commentaries and discussions in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in the Anglophone world. You will find stark, unqualified 61 “Habetur autem Scientia de iis quae semper eadem, et eodem modo sunt: huius modi sunt summa rerum principia, et aeternae rerum omnium rationes.” (Summary of Plato’s Theages, Divini Platonis Opera Omnia, 6.) 62 Because a true doxa about something, once tied down, becomes epistêmê—plausibly about this very same thing (98a). For discussion of this passage, and my own attempt to reconcile it with the Distinct Objects interpretation, see Chapter 9.

A brief history of the Distinct Objects interpretation  41 statements of the Distinct Objects view. Here is Cornford, using the term ‘Two Worlds’ to characterize the Republic’s metaphysical view, and then moving unapologetically to a matching epistemology: Corresponding to the two worlds, the mind has two faculties: Knowledge of the real and Belief in appearances [doxa]. . . . Knowledge, by definition, is of unique, unchanging objects. . . . Doxa and its cognates denote our apprehension of anything that seems: . . . . what seems to exist, sensible appearances, phenomena [and only these, i.e. doxa does not apprehend Forms].  (Cornford 1941, 180–1)

Or, typically of the period, here is Adam commenting on the powers argument: The εἴδη [Forms] provide objects for Knowledge, as opposed to Opinion, and they are capable of being known.  (Adam 1902, comment ad 476a)

He adds nothing about the Forms being opinable in an indirect or derivative way, nor anything about perceptibles being knowable in any way. Moreover, the statement is quite casual: he does not treat it as in need of special explanation or excuse. Nor does he, nor do others of his era, make any note of the various textual obstacles to the Distinct Objects reading flagged by Fine and others: he is silent about the apparent reference to doxa of Forms at 506c–e, and equally about the apparent reference to epistêmê of perceptibles at 520c. We find the same pattern in other commentaries of the era.63 In multiple commentaries, alive to all kinds of textual ambiguities and philosophical questions, the issues that motivate the Overlap reading go almost entirely unnoted. (I have found one exception: Murphy (1951, at 123–4) argues that there must be doxa of Forms, using the same kind of arguments we find in Vogt 2012.) Moreover, in these commentaries, as in the others surveyed in this section, we also find very specific interpretations of epistêmê and doxa as special states by nature confined to a particular kind of object. I detail some of these interpretations in Chapters 5 and 8, but briefly: epistêmê, often translated as ‘Science,’ is treated as something like a priori knowledge of ultimate reality; doxa, often translated as ‘Opinion,’ is treated as something like

63  See Jowett and Campbell 1894, Bosanquet 1895, Shorey 1930.

42 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology experience-based, atheoretical thought about particular perceptibles. Far from treating the implications of Plato’s Distinct Objects as something to be explained away, these commentators seem to regard it instead as a revealing guide to what epistêmê and doxa in fact are. On the other hand, suppose you are learning about Plato’s epistemology by reading Plato scholarship in the analytic tradition in the 1960s and 1970s. For the most part, you will still be innocent of any doubts that Plato held a Distinct Objects view. You will however encounter doubts about the viability of the view. In 1962 Crombie discusses disagreement among ­scholars about whether Plato had any good reason to hold the view, where all parties to the debate assume that he did in fact hold it (vol. 2, p. 34). Scholars are starting to see the view as problematic. From there the ground is laid for new interpretations of familiar texts, on which the view is not in fact Plato’s (Gosling 1968, Fine 1978). By 1997 an article can refer to the Distinct Objects interpretation as “outrageous” (Baltzly 1997, 240). Thus doubts about the Distinct Objects interpretation, so pervasive now, are a very modern phenomenon indeed. Why does the Distinct Objects view suddenly start to seem problematic in the middle of the twentieth century? I have already suggested an explanation above: our contemporary epistemology is an Overlap epistemology. Its star players, knowledge and belief, are not distinguished by their objects. Thus we are imposing our own epistemological views on Plato. As confirmation for this explanation, it is worth realizing that Overlap views in epistemology in general are a fairly modern innovation. If older scholars found no problem attributing a Distinct Objects view to Plato, that is at least in part because—I will argue in Section 4—such a view seemed to them perfectly sensible and familiar.

4.  Distinct Objects beyond Plato On a popular interpretation, Parmenides holds a Distinct Objects epis­tem­­ ology—and indeed one very like the one I will attribute to Plato in this book. There are two main cognitive kinds, nous and doxa. Nous is of Truth, or Being. Doxa is of something quite different: the realm most mortals concern themselves with, which is in fact merely what seems (ta dokounta, B1.32).64 64  See for example Cornford  1933 and Palmer  1999. For discussion and defense of this interpretation of Parmenides’ doxa, see Chapter 8.

Distinct Objects beyond Plato  43 More explicitly, we find a Distinct Objects view in Plato’s student, Aristotle: The object of epistêmê [to epistêton] and epistêmê differ from the object of doxa [to doxaston] and doxa, because epistêmê is universal and comes through necessities. . . . [while] doxa is concerned with what is true or false but can also be otherwise  (Posterior Analytics 88b30–89a3) Let it be laid down that there are two parts of the soul that have logos, one by which we contemplate those things whose first principles do not admit of being otherwise, and one by which we contemplate those [whose principles] do admit of being otherwise: for in relation to things different in kind, so the part of the soul related to each is different in kind, since indeed cognition [gnôsis] belongs to the parts by virtue of some likeness and kinship. Let one of these be called the part capable of epistêmê [epistêmonikon] and the other the part capable of calculation [logistikon]…[The second part is also called] the part capable of doxa [doxastikon], for both doxa and practical wisdom [phronêsis] are about what can be otherwise. (Nicomachean Ethics 1139a6–12; 1140b26–28)

According to the passage from the Ethics, there are two different types of objects in the world, and these are contemplated by different powers. Things that are necessarily as they are (such as universals, essences, or God) are contemplated by a part of the soul responsible for epistêmê. Things that are contingently as they are, and can change (particulars, accidental properties), are contemplated by a different part of the soul, the part responsible for doxa. This looks to be a robust Distinct Objects view: that Aristotle has in mind two classes of object, rather than for example two types of prop­os­ ition, is confirmed by his redescription below of what can be otherwise as things that can be done or made, and what cannot be otherwise as what is eternal, ungenerated and imperishable.65 There is less clarity about how to interpret the claim in the Posterior Analytics: perhaps the distinction here is between types of propositions (necessary and contingent) rather than types of objects.66 Even if so, however, Aristotle’s metaphysics entails that epistêmê 65  “Everyone believes that what we have epistêmê of [ἐπιστάμεθα] does not admit of being otherwise . . . Therefore the object of epistêmê [ἐπιστητόν] is of necessity. Therefore it is eternal, for the things that are of necessity without qualification are all eternal. And eternal things are ungenerated and imperishable” (Nicomachean Ethics 1139b20–4). “In the class of what admits of being otherwise, there is both what can be made and what can be done [ποιητὸν καὶ πρακτόν]” (Nicomachean Ethics 1140a1–2). 66 Aristotle goes on to define (non-demonstrative) epistêmê as “belief [ὑπόληψις] in an immediate proposition” and doxa as “belief in a proposition that is immediate and not necessary” (Posterior Analytics 88b37, 89a3–4).

44 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology will therefore only be about certain kinds of objects—objects about which there can be true substantive necessary propositions, such as essences and universals.67 Aristotle thus clearly presents a version of the Distinct Objects view that scholars have been so reluctant to attribute to Plato. What is more, he tells us that these Distinct Objects views are widely held:68 Nobody thinks that they have a doxa [doxazein] when they think it impossible for it [the thing under consideration] to be otherwise, but rather that they have epistêmê [epistasthai]. (Posterior Analytics 89a6–8)69 Everyone believes that what we have epistêmê of does not admit of being otherwise (Nicomachean Ethics 1139b19–21) Many people deny that there is epistêmê of perceptibles.  (Topics 114a23)

Why is there no “Two Worlds” debate about Aristotle, as there is about Plato? Surely in large part because he so clearly characterizes epistêmê as a very specialized state, and one that by its nature cannot be of contingent facts or truths. Epistêmê is achieved when we deduce necessary truths from necessary first principles (see Nicomachean Ethics VI.6 and Posterior Analytics I.2).70 Given this explicit account, there is no temptation to assume that he has in mind ordinary knowledge, and likewise no temptation to insist that he must mean to allow epistêmê of perceptibles. (His account of doxa is less clear and also less studied; the fact that he treats doxa as one species of a wider genus, hupolêpsis, where the latter clearly has much in common with belief, has perhaps taken some of the pressure off of his doxa to play that role and made interpreters happier to think of it as something more specific.)71 What about Aristotle’s claims that these Distinct Objects views are widespread? We have some independent evidence to support these. Consider an 67  As Fine acknowledges in a recent paper on the Posterior Analytics (Fine 2010). Proclus interprets Aristotle the way I suggest: epistêmê is of the stable unchanging essences in an object, doxa of the shifting particular properties: In Rem publicam 1.260.29–264.20. 68  Some hold that in the passages quoted below Aristotle means “nobody” and “we all” to refer only to members of the Academy; this would still establish that he finds the view in Plato, but the passages from Isocrates presented below support unqualified readings. 69  This claim on its own leaves room for doxai about necessary matters that one does not recognize as necessary, although the other passages just quoted seem to rule out even this. 70  Aristotle does often use ‘epistêmê’ in what is clearly a looser sense, on which for example paradigmatic crafts like medicine count: see for example Nicomachean Ethics 1138b26–32. 71  See Moss and Schwab 2019.

Distinct Objects beyond Plato  45 argument we find in Plato’s contemporary, Isocrates. There is no epistêmê of political affairs, nor indeed of any practical matters (“what we should do or what we should say”), because in realms where individual cases vary widely, and so success depends on finding the “right occasion” (kairos), there can only be better or worse doxai: Since is not in human nature to attain an epistêmê by having which we can know [eideimen]  what should be said or done, for the rest I consider wise those who are able by their doxai to hit on what is best for the most part, and I consider those who occupy themselves with the studies from which they will most quickly attain that kind of wisdom [phronêsis] to be philo­sophers. (Isocrates, Antidosis 271; cf. 184)

Isocrates certainly does not share Plato’s metaphysics, but he too argues that the domain of epistêmê is sharply restricted, with the contingent realm left to doxa. Certainly however there is no “Two Worlds” debate about Isocrates—not just because he is less famous, but also because it is clear that he has in mind by epistêmê a specialized state, rather than ordinary know­ ledge: something like expertise. (Arguably he also has in mind by doxa something different from ordinary belief: developed theory.)72 Evidently then Aristotle was right that his own Distinct Objects view was not a radical one, at least as far as the restriction on epistêmê is concerned. Moreover, it was a view with lasting appeal for the Greeks: three centuries later we find Dionysius of Halicarnassis saying that no-one has defined a technê of the right occasion (kairos), for this “cannot in general be captured by epistêmê, but by doxa.”73 Distinct Objects epistemologies are also widespread among Plato’s selfdeclared followers, the Platonists. We see this already in the first Platonists. Xenocrates, head of the Academy toward the end of the fourth Century bce, is reported to have divided all reality into three kinds of objects: the objects of epistêmê, those of doxa, and those of perception (Sextus, Adversus Mathematicos 7.147–9). We do not have enough resources to understand the view in detail, and in particular to rule out that he held a moderate Overlap view, but we also have nothing to suggest it.

72  For this view of doxa see Poulakos 2001. 73  οὐδ᾽ ὅλως ἐπιστήμῃ θηρατός ἐστιν ὁ καιρὸς ἀλλὰ δόξῃ, De Compositione Verborum 45.17.

46 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology Or consider Plutarch, a middle Platonist. Above we saw him endorse a distinction between the unchanging, imperceptible noêton and the shifting, perceptible doxaston, in attributing that distinction to both Parmenides and Plato (Adversus Colotem 13). He defends this kind of view elsewhere too: see for example De Iside et Osiride 383c–d, which contrasts the “pure and simple noêton” with the “mixed and varied doxasta.” Plutarch scholars take such passages to reveal a stark Distinct Objects view: as one puts it, it is one of the “basic assumptions” of Plutarch’s epistemology that “sense-perception . . .  results in mere opinion [δόξα] about the always changing world, and real knowledge or intellection on the other hand is restricted to the world of Forms” (Sierksma-Agteres 2015; compare Boys-Stones 1997 and Scott 1987).74 It seems that Plutarch did not hold even a moderate Overlap view: the claim is not that we can have noêsis of perceptibles in a derivative or deficient way, but simply that we could not have noêsis of per­cep­tibles at all. As for the Neoplatonists, their intricate and complex epistemology is very clearly concerned to separate the objects of the highest cognitive kind from those of doxa. Proclus not only attributes to Plato a Distinct Objects epis­tem­ ol­ogy in the Republic and Timaeus, but endorses the view himself: see the passages quoted above, and the entire discussion of Timaeus 28a in his In Timaeum.75 Plotinus tells us that “the name of doxa fits” the study of perceptibles, while epistêmâi “of intelligibles, which are really epistêmai, come from nous to the rational soul and do not think any perceptible thing” (Ennead V.9.7; cf. VI.9.3).76 As for nous itself, it is not only of the intelligible Forms but in fact identical with them (see especially Ennead V.5.8). There is no more exclusive relation possible between cognitive kind and object. We saw some Overlappers argue that Plato’s highest cognitive kind is typically of Forms but atypically of perceptibles, or by nature of Forms but derivatively or deficiently of perceptibles, but no such move is possible on this view: a thing cannot be identical to something other than itself, not even atypically or derivatively or deficiently; thus there can be no nous of perceptibles.

74  Boys-Stones argues that Plutarch follows Plato in thinking that “the ontological reliance of the sensible world on the realm of the divine means that the former can be used as an epis­ temo­logic­al ‘tool’ in the quest for knowledge of the latter—but is not an object of true know­ ledge itself . . . the sensible world is just intrinsically unknowable…[by contrast with] the divine realm, where alone true knowledge is to be found” (Boys-Stones 1997, 228, 230). 75  For discussion see Lautner (2002) 260–1. 76  Αἱ δὲ ἐπιστῆμαι ἐν ψυχῇ λογικῇ οὖσαι αἱ μὲν τῶν αἰσθητῶν—εἰ δεῖ ἐπιστήμας τούτων λέγειν, πρέπει δὲ αὐταῖς τὸ τῆς δόξης ὄνομα—ὕστεραι τῶν πραγμάτων οὖσαι εἰκόνες εἰσὶ τούτων· τῶν δὲ νοητῶν, αἳ δὴ καὶ ὄντως ἐπιστῆμαι, παρὰ νοῦ εἰς λογικὴν ψυχὴν ἐλθοῦσαι αἰσθητὸν μὲν οὐδὲν νοοῦσι.

Distinct Objects beyond Plato  47 Thus Plato’s followers not only take him to hold Distinct Objects views, but also develop such views of their own. They carve up reality into distinct classes and correlate these with distinct cognitive kinds; in so doing they pay no attention to the worries that motivate Overlap readings. Moreover, they give specialized accounts of the cognitive kinds which make them look quite different from modern knowledge and belief. In Plotinus, for example, noêsis or nous is direct union with intelligible objects, while doxa is passive reception (Ennead V.5.1.63–66). Nor are such views confined to Platonists. The restriction of the highest cognitive kind to intelligibles survives, with modifications, through the medievals’ theory of Scientia; it retains its hold throughout the early modern period, with Aquinas, Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Descartes and others explicitly confining the highest kind in their system to necessary truths.77 We much more rarely find anything like the restriction of doxa to per­cep­ tibles, but Hume is a notable exception: he embraces a full-blown Distinct Objects view, on which knowledge is restricted to necessary truths (“relations of ideas”), and belief to the wholly distinct class of contingent affairs (“matters of fact”).78 In short, there is a long philosophical tradition according to which a superior cognitive kind—nous, epistêmê, scientia, scientific knowledge, knowledge—is sharply distinguished from an inferior kind, doxa, opinio, opinion, or belief; it is a firm part of this tradition that the superior kind is restricted to a special kind of object, and it is a less prevalent but significant part of this tradition that the inferior kind is restricted in its objects too, so that there is no overlap between their objects. My aim in this brief historical survey has been to show just how unsurprising it would be to a reader of Plato in his own day, or of any day up until very recent ones, to find him distinguishing epistêmê and doxa by their objects. The modern view that superior and inferior cognitive kinds can obviously overlap in their objects turns out to be very modern indeed, and 77  Locke’s “sensitive knowledge” is arguably an exception, although his view of science fits this description. For citations and defense of this reading of Spinoza, Leibniz, and Descartes, see Carriero 2013; for the path from Aristotle to Hume see Morris and Brown 2001, Section 5, and more generally for the path from Aristotle to early modern Scientia see Pasnau  2017 Chapter 2. 78  For Hume’s distinction (sometimes referred to disparagingly as Hume’s Fork), see especially Treatise I.iii.1. His Distinct Objects view is probably subtler than Aristotle’s, or the one I am imputing to Plato; it would be an interesting project to see in detail how they compare. For one thing, while Hume clearly distinguishes the objects of knowledge and belief, he is very loose with the corresponding verbs. Then there is the question of exactly what sort of overlap he will allow.

48 Plato ’ s “ Two Worlds ” Epistemology this should make us suspicious of the assumption that Plato shared it. Indeed, the arguments of this section should open us to the possibility that Plato’s epistêmê and doxa have considerably less in common with know­ ledge and belief as nowadays conceived than they do with some of the states we have seen canvassed in this section—that Plato’s epistemology is much more like Aristotle’s or Hume’s than like our own.

5.  A new starting point Only around 1960 did scholars start to agree that there are glaring problems for the Distinct Objects interpretation of Plato’s epistemology; before that it was the default, usually accepted without argument. Moreover, many philo­ sophers held similar epistemologies themselves. A dramatic shift occurred: an epistemological view that was once widespread in its own right, and almost unquestioningly attributed to Plato, is now regarded as beyond the pale. The idea that a Distinct Objects epistemology is a non-starter is a thoroughly modern idea; the idea that Plato cannot have held one is radically ahistorical. Moreover, we can identify one major driver of the shift. The dominant approach to Plato’s epistemology in recent years begins from the assumption that epistêmê and doxa are more or less what we call knowledge and belief, uses our views about these to constrain our interpretation of Plato, and concludes that the Distinct Objects interpretation is absurd. We have seen some evidence already, however—and will see more in Chapters  5 and 8—that the same scholars who accepted the Distinct Objects in­ter­pret­ ation without question were working with accounts of cognitive kinds which look quite different from contemporary knowledge and belief. Perhaps then it is not that for two millennia no-one noticed the oddness of distinguishing knowledge and belief by their objects, but instead that ­scholars took Plato to be investigating something else.79

79 Or more precisely, something understood so differently from how people nowadays understand knowledge and belief that even if they are in fact identical, modern intuitions are a poor guide. See again my caveat in the Introduction: on some theories of concept identity, or some theories of knowledge and belief, these older interpreters were still talking about know­ ledge and belief but giving very different accounts of them than most philosophers give today; on other theories, they were talking about something else. I return to this question in Chapters 5.4 and 8.4.

A new starting point  49 Were older interpreters on the right track with their accounts of Plato’s epistêmê and doxa? I will argue that in many cases they were. We need however to develop a systematic way of understanding Plato’s epistemology. What we have seen in this chapter suggests that we have good reason to reverse the current dominant approach: rather than assuming our own epis­ temo­ logic­ al views as a starting-point, we should assume the Distinct Objects interpretation, and use it to guide our investigations into the nature of Platonic doxa and epistêmê. That is the plan of this book.

2

Plato’s Objects-Based Epistemology What happens when we read Plato’s epistemology without in any way trying to avoid a Distinct Objects interpretation? What we find, I argue in this chapter, is ample evidence not only for that interpretation, but also for a stronger one. Looking both at Republic V’s powers argument and at other discussions of powers, we find evidence for three crucial claims about the relation between powers, their accomplishments, and their objects. First, powers and their accomplishments are individuated by their objects (Section 1). Second, the rationale for this thesis comes from a stronger one: powers and their accomplishments are defined by their objects: it is the objects that make them what they are (Section 2). Finally, in the case of cognitive p ­ owers, the accomplishments—understood as occurrent cognitions—inherit their character from their objects: cognition works on the principle Aristotle calls “like-by-like” (Section 3). Thus Plato’s epistemology is thoroughly objects-based. Epistêmê is, in essence, the kind of thing one can have only in relation to a special kind of object; doxa is, in its essence, the kind of thing one can have only in relation to a different special kind of object. A few notes are in order before I begin. First, although I will be discussing Plato’s notion of powers, I do not aim to give a full account of this notion, but instead focus on the relation between powers and their objects; thus I leave open important questions when they do not bear directly on this relation. (For example: Does he have a consistent doctrine of powers across the dialogue? Are some powers subordinate to others, and if so how? What is the relation between powers and parts of soul? In particular, how are the powers of epistêmê and doxa as described in Republic V’s powers argument related to the single inborn power mentioned later on (518c), which looks like a more general cognitive faculty?1) 1  I discuss this last issue briefly in Section 3. Szaif 2007 takes Republic 518c to show that there is just one cognitive power, which can be used either to cognize Forms or to cognize perceptibles, with the result that doxa and epistêmê are not genuine powers on a par with sight Plato’s Epistemology: Being and Seeming. Jessica Moss, Oxford University Press (2021). © Jessica Moss. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198867401.003.0003

Plato’s Objects-Based Epistemology   51 Second, as throughout this book, I use the English words ‘cognition’ and ‘cognitive’ to characterize both epistêmê and doxa. I do not mean to beg the question of what epistêmê and doxa are, nor—when I go on to say that both powers’ accomplishments are cognitive—to violate the principle I will ascribe to Plato below, that different powers must have different accomplishments. Instead, I use ‘cognition’ to refer to something for which Plato has no single term: the genus of which both doxa and epistêmê are species.2 Third, the main evidence for the “like-by-like” interpretation of Plato’s epistemology comes from the Two Worlds dialogues, those that distinguish a realm of intelligible Forms from the realm of perceptible particulars. Thus here, as throughout the book, I am trying to show that Plato’s epistemology is best understood as taking full shape in the Two Worlds dialogues, with anticipations and echoes in the earlier and later dialogues. Finally: the strategy of this chapter is to assume the viability of the Distinct Objects interpretation, in order to clear the way for the main ­project of this book: an objects-based account of epistêmê and doxa. Nonetheless, many of the arguments I give serve as further evidence for the Distinct Objects interpretation. Against various Moderate Overlap views, including the Content Overlap view, we will see Plato using objects to distinguish the cognitive accomplishments just as much as the powers themselves, and we will also see strong suggestions that the relevant objects are subject matters. Against any form of Overlap view, the evidence that cognitions resemble their objects entails that doxa can only be of things that resemble doxa, while epistêmê can only be of things that resemble epistêmê; given how different the two cognitive kinds are, on Plato’s view, this means that they can never share objects. Thus this chapter will indirectly support the Distinct Objects ­interpretation; a full defense of that interpretation must wait however until I have addressed the putative evidence for epistêmê of perceptibles (Chapter 4.5) and doxa of Forms (Chapter 7.6). or hearing. Plato might however hold that doxa and epistêmê, while subordinated to a more general power, are genuine powers themselves. Perhaps there is one main cognitive faculty, which in turn has the powers of epistêmê and of doxa; which of these it exercises depends on the available objects (compare Aristotle’s distinction between the common and special senses, on some interpretations—e.g., Everson 1997). Or perhaps the power to cognize in general is inborn, but must be developed to become the power of epistêmê; what results is nonetheless a genuine power, just as crafts are powers. 2  The powers argument classifies both as powers (dunameis, 477b), while the Divided Line passage speaks of affections (pathêmata, 511d), but these terms are both far too broad to get at what specially unites epistêmê and doxa—for example, Plato will elsewhere call strength a power, and anger an affection.

52 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology

1.  Powers and their accomplishments are individuated by their objects We can begin with the famous powers argument of Republic V. The conclusion of the argument is that the sight-lovers, since they attend to perceptible beautiful things but not the Form, have only doxa, not epistêmê. I gave a brief summary of the argument in Chapter 1.1; here are the crucial lines on the relation of powers, accomplishments, and objects: Do we say that powers [dunameis] are one class of the things that are, by which we have the power to do the things we have the power to do, and everything else has the power to do what it has the power to do? I mean for example sight and hearing are among the powers, if you understand the kind I mean . . . In a power I see no color or shape or anything of that sort, as one does in many other things, looking toward which I can define/ distinguish [diorizomai] for myself different ones from one another. In a power I look toward this thing only: what it is over and what it accomplishes [eph’ hôi te esti kai ho apergazetai], and in that way I call each of these a power. And what is set over the same thing and accomplishes the same thing I call the same power, while what is over something different and accomplishes something different I call a different power. . . Do you say that epistêmê itself is a power, or what class do you put it in? – In that class, he said, and of all powers the strongest. – And what about this, will we refer doxa to [the class of] powers or to some other kind? – Not at all to another kind, he said; for that by which we have the power to form doxa [doxazein] is no other than doxa. (Republic 477c–e, emphases added)

What distinguishes one power from all others is (a) “what it is over” and (b) “what it accomplishes.” What does Plato have in mind? We will have to determine what it means for cognitive powers to be “over” things, but for now let us leave the question open while following convention in using the term ‘object’ for a power’s relatum, whatever kind of relation Plato has in mind. As for the accomplishments, Plato here explicitly says that doxa is the power by which we doxazein (the verbal form of doxa— having or forming doxa); in the course of identifying epistêmê’s object below he says that epistêmê “is set over what is, to have gnôsis [gnônai] of it as it is” (478a); he nowhere else names anything that could plausibly be either ­powers’ accomplishment. ‘What a power accomplishes’ is thus evidently

Powers and their accomplishments  53 simply a way of referring to what it does (compare the equation at Hippias Minor 373d–e of what something does (poiei) with what it accomplishes (ergazetai)), and Plato’s thought seems to be that what these particular ­powers do is simply get exercised. Certainly in some cases he thinks that a power’s accomplishment is a distinct product. See especially Charmides 165c–d: medicine, defined as “epistêmê of the healthy,” “accomplishes a fine accomplishment, health.”3 But his idea in the Republic’s powers argument is a plausible one: epistêmê and doxa without qualification (by contrast with a technê like medicine, although Plato does sometimes call this ‘epistêmê’) accomplish in the first instance nothing but their own exercises.4 One might think that Plato should distinguish between the activity of cognizing on the one hand, and the resulting cognitive state on the other, and reserve “accomplishment” for the latter, but I see no evidence that he finds that distinction important in this context, or even tries to track it. In what follows, then, I  will speak indifferently of powers’ second individuating criterion as accomplishments and as exercises. Thus each power is individuated by two things: its object and its accomplishment. One might think that these two criteria are independent of one another, and therefore that two powers could share the same object, while being distinguished by their accomplishments. One might even argue that Plato’s sole examples support this reading: sight and hearing are set over the same things—material objects—but accomplish different things, sight seeing them while hearing hears them. There are however clear signs that this is not what Plato intends. (Indeed, this is widely recognized, and the argument is sometimes accused of invalidity on these grounds.)5 Not only does he refer to the distinguishing criteria as “this thing [singular] only [ekeino monon]” (477d), as if the two criteria are effectively one, but in the ensuing argument he twice stresses that a difference in powers entails a difference in

3  τὴν γὰρ ὑγίειαν καλὸν ἡμῖν ἔργον ἀπεργάζεται. Compare Hippias Minor 375d–376a, where justice, defined as a power, is that through which a soul accomplishes (ἐργάζεται) fine and shameful things. 4  This distinction between different kinds of accomplishment is one that Aristotle makes explicit: some activities have a function or accomplishment (ergon, the root of the verb I translate ‘accomplish’) distinct from the activity, while in other cases the ergon is the activity itself (Nicomachean Ethics 1094a4–5). 5  See for example Balztly 1997. Fine takes this worry to be insurmountable for the reading on which powers are set over objects, rather than propositions (1990).

54 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology object, clearly ignoring the possibility of distinct powers doing different things with respect to the same object: We agree that epistêmê is different from doxa? – Different. – So each is by nature over [epi] something different, since each has the power for something different?6 – Necessarily. . . . If different powers [dunameis] are by nature over different things, and both of these are powers, doxa and epistêmê, and different from one another, as we say – from these things it follows that the same thing cannot be the object of gnôsis and of doxa.7 (Republic 478a–b, emphases added)

Evidently Plato is assuming that there is no accomplishing different things with respect to the same object. We can make sense of this assumption, and render the argument valid, if we construe the notion of object very narrowly: for example, the object of sight is color, rather than material objects.8 Indeed, when at 507c–e Plato again refers to sight and hearing as powers, he explicitly identifies the object of sight, the visible (to horaton), as color—what Aristotle will call sight’s special (idion) object, the one exclusive to it. At 524a he refers to the objects that each power is “set over” (tetagmenê epi)—the same language he used for the relation between power and object in our passage—and again has in mind special objects: touch is over the hard, soft, heavy and light (524a). In the Timaeus hearing is defined as a motion caused by sound (67b; cf. 67c on sight and color); the Theaetetus goes further, arguing explicitly that the only perceptibles are special objects like color and sound (184e–5a). In the Charmides, Socrates lists sight and hearing as powers (dunameis), and says that “hearing is the hearing of nothing other than sound,” while sight can only be of color (168d). Each of these powers, then, has its own object; there is no crossover between them. Note that on this view it is perfectly acceptable to speak, as Plato sometimes does, of one and the same physical object as being both visible and audible: the idea would be that it achieves this by having both a color and a sound.9 The claim is that the objects of different powers are distinct, 6  ἐφ’ ἑτέρῳ ἄρα ἕτερόν τι δυναμένη ἑκατέρα αὐτῶν πέφυκεν. 7  ἐκ τούτων δὴ οὐκ ἐγχωρεῖ γνωστὸν καὶ δοξαστὸν ταὐτὸν εἶναι. 8  Crombie suggests that Plato is thinking of objects as “internal accusatives”: “the internal accusative of ‘see’ is ‘sights’, of ‘smell’ is ‘smells’; and it is true that sight and only sight sees sights and nothing but sights” (1962, vol. 2, 57). I hope to show that my reading is better supported by Plato’s examples. 9  There are further questions about how to apply the objects-individuation theory to perception, which Plato leaves under-determined. First, might he instead think that substances

Powers and their accomplishments  55 ­ on-identical; this does not entail that they will always be separate. In n ­principle we might find that the objects of epistêmê and doxa can be compresent in the same objects too; indeed I shall argue in Chapter 9 that Plato hints at this view in the Meno, although he sharply rejects it with his Two Worlds metaphysics.10 What about the accomplishments of powers: can they share objects, as on various Overlap interpretations canvassed in Chapter 1? Plato strongly indicates that this is not his view, for the Republic’s powers argument moves without argument from claims about the objects of powers to claims about the objects of their accomplishments.11 After first stating that each distinct power is over something distinct and accomplishes something distinct, he says that “Epistêmê is over what is, to have gnôsis of [gnônai] it as it is” (478a): both power and accomplishment are directed toward what is. In demonstrating that the power of doxa is not over “what is not,” he argues that “it is impossible to have doxa of [doxasai] what is not . . . Doesn’t the one who has doxa [doxazôn] bear his doxa over something?” (478b): the verb doxazein surely refers to the power’s accomplishment (cf. 478c), and here the noun doxa very plausibly does too.12 Whatever the power of doxa is over, so too is its accomplishment. Finally, in summing up the powers argument, he makes Distinct Objects claims about the accomplishments: “Those who contemplate the many beautifuls . . . have doxa of [doxazein] everything and have gnôsis of [gignôskein] nothing of the things they have doxa of,” while those who contemplate the Beautiful Itself and other Forms “have gnôsis [gignôskein] but do not have doxa [doxazein]” (479e). The claim seems to be a very stark one indeed: it is not just that the power of doxa is suited to perceptibles, but that if you attend to perceptibles you will like Socrates or a finger are not strictly speaking perceived at all, but instead the objects of another power—perhaps doxa? That is sometimes taken to be the lesson of Theaetetus 184–7; Proclus for example applies it more widely (see his comment ad Timaeus 28a at In Timaeum 2.248.16–17.) Second, what about the properties Aristotle calls common perceptibles, like size and shape? At Republic 523e Plato says that sight sees bigness and smallness (to megathos, hê smikrotatêta), just as touch feels thickness, thinness, hardness and softness. Does he notice that big and small are commons, while the others are propers? I suspect not. The same issue arises at Theaetetus 184–7: does he mean to deny that we perceive size, shape, motion? He seems oblivious of the issue. Were he to try to fit common perceptibles into his theory of powers, he might do it by saying that we directly perceive the propers, and thereby indirectly become aware of the commons. 10 Annas  1981 attributes a version of this view to Plato in the Republic: one can have epistêmê of Socrates’ humanness, but not of his justice. 11  Thanks to Damien Storey for pointing out the significance of these passages. 12  Or perhaps more precisely, to the product of an exercise—the activity of doxazein yields a doxa—but in any case not to the power.

56 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology only accomplish that power’s accomplishment, and mutatis mutandis for epistêmê and Forms. There are no other discussions in Plato which explicitly lay out this objects-individuation theory of powers, but there are several others which discuss the same phenomena which Republic V refers to as powers, sometimes using that label explicitly, and they fit this objects-individuation model very well. Consider first a discussion mentioned above in the Charmides, particularly relevant for us because here as in Republic V Plato classifies epistêmê and doxa as powers alongside sight and hearing. Socrates is arguing against the hypothesis that temperance is “epistêmê of epistêmê” by showing that each power is only of some particular other object, not of itself. Sight is of color (not of sight), hearing is of sound (not of hearing), and the list con­ tinues: appetite is for pleasure, wish is for the good, erôs is for the beautiful, fear is of the terrible, and doxa is “of the things that doxai are of ” (hôn doxazousin); thus it would be very strange if some epistêmê were of epistêmê itself, rather than of what-can-be-learned (to mathêma) (Charmides 167e–168a). Summing up the argument a few lines later he uses the term “dunamis” to label the category he has been discussing (168d). We can then generalize the point as follows: each power is exercised in relation to (pros) its special object (168d), or is of (objective genitive) its particular object (168a).13 Moreover, this includes epistêmê and doxa: although the characterization of their objects is minimally informative, it at the very least leaves open that these objects are distinct, and the fact that all the other members of the list have proprietary objects suggests that these do too. The Charmides’ argument does not explicitly mention anything cor­res­ pond­ing to the Republic’s “what the power accomplishes,” but it is very nat­ural to read it as saying that the accomplishments too, not only the ­powers, are individuated by the correlated objects: surely Plato thinks not only that the power of appetite is related to the pleasant but that so too is what the power accomplishes—the activity of having appetites; likewise for sight and color, and so on. Indeed in the characterization of doxa, an accomplishment-term, the verb doxazein, is built into the specification of the power’s object (168a).

13  Anything to which the power applies must have “that being [ousia] in relation to which the power is” (τὴν οὐσίαν πρὸς ἣν ἡ δύναμις αὐτοῦ ἦν) (168d); throughout the discussion Plato usually uses the genitive, e.g. appetite is of pleasure (ἡδονῆς, 167e), fear is “of fearful things” (τῶν δεινῶν, 168a).

Powers and their accomplishments  57 A brief digression is in order here before we move to other passages. The Charmides’ examples suggest an important distinction between two kinds of power-object relations which Plato does not discuss. Sight can only be of what really is colored: if you think mistakenly that the air is colored you do not thereby see it. We might naturally think that fear is by contrast of what one thinks terrible, whether or not it really is: if you think that an innocuous spider is dangerous you will fear it; if you are unaware that a lethal lollipop is dangerous you will not fear it. There are various ways of theorizing this distinction: some powers are related to objects de re and others de dicto, or some powers’ objects are defined extensionally and others intensionally. It is natural to ask whether Plato recognizes this distinction, and how it bears on his understanding of cognitive powers’ objects. As to the first question, I do not have room here for a full treatment, but it is worth noting that he very much seems to reject the distinction when it comes to desire: wish (boulêsis) is not for what seems good, but what is good (Gorgias 467b–468d); people desire and have appetites for what is really good, not for bad things they think good (Meno 77a–78a). In this case at least, Plato rejects our intuition that a power’s object should be defined de dicto. He does not explicitly consider the question for other powers such as fear, and perhaps there is something special about desire, or the good, that makes this case different. What about epistêmê and doxa? My account of their objects, in Chapters 3 and 6, will entail that here at any rate the objects are defined de re. There is something about certain things (Beings, I will argue) that makes them possible objects of epistêmê, and something about certain other things (perceptible things, I will argue) that makes them possible objects of doxa. One can ­mistakenly think that one is in touch with an object of epistêmê, and thus mistakenly think that one has epistêmê (as do the sight-lovers in Republic V), but thinking does not make it so. Now let us consider another passage which proves a useful source for Plato’s theory of powers, although he does not here use that term. I have in mind Republic IV’s discussion of how various phenomena, including ones the Charmides characterizes as powers, are related to objects. The context is the argument for the division of the soul. Socrates wants to show that appetite can conflict with rational desire, and his argument depends on the claim that “thirst itself ” is for drink rather than for good drink. He begins by individuating species of appetite by their objects: thirst is for drink, hunger for food, and in general each appetite is for “just what it is of by nature” (houper pephuken) (437e). Plato does not here use the word dunamis, but appetites were on the Charmides’ list of powers, and it is fairly easy to see how to

58 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology make the examples here fit Republic V’s two-part formula: the power of thirst is the power to feel thirst (what it accomplishes) for drink (what it is over). Here too then, both powers and accomplishments are individuated by their objects.14 Indeed Plato goes on to make the correlation even more fine-grained: different kinds of drink—hot drink, cold drink, much drink—correspond each to their own kind of thirst (“If some heat is added to the thirst, it would render it an appetite for cold [drink]” (437d–e)). Is the idea here that the power of thirst for cold drink is different from the power of thirst for hot drink—or instead that there is just one power, thirst, which can be activated in different ways, yielding different accomplishments set over different objects? The latter sounds more plausible. This would mean that we here have a case in which the accomplishments are more finely object-individuated than the powers. On the other hand, perhaps Plato thinks that to have the power of thirst entails having other powers too: the power to thirst for cold drink in the appropriate circumstances, and so on. I will not try to settle this question, since I think doing so would involve pressing Plato’s theory ­farther than he has determined it. What I want to emphasize is that this passage in Republic IV extends the objects-individuation principle—and indeed the fine-grained version of it—to epistêmê: What about the epistêmai [pl.]? Isn’t it the same way? Epistêmê itself is epistêmê of what-can-be-learned [to mathêma] itself, or of whatever one should posit epistêmê as being of, while a particular epistêmê of a particular kind is of a particular something of a particular kind. I mean this kind of thing: when epistêmê came to be of building houses, didn’t it differ from the other epistêmai, so that it was called architecture?  (Republic 438c–d)

Epistêmê has its own proprietary object, the same one we saw in the Charmides: what can be learned. Moreover, for each particular kind of thing 14  Does Plato violate the one-to-one principle I’m attributing to him by assigning different objects to appetite in different contexts: pleasure in the Charmides (167e), and things like drink and food in the Republic? I think he more likely had varying thoughts about the best way to specify the objects of appetites: perhaps thirst is for drink (Republic 437d), perhaps it is for the pleasure of drink—which would accommodate the Charmides’ claim, and also fit well with the description of the appetitive part at the conclusion of Republic IV’s argument as the “companion of indulgences and pleasures” (439d); perhaps instead, as he argues in the Philebus, thirst is a desire for being filled with drink (35a). Plausibly then Plato considered various models, but all support the view that the appetites do not overlap in their objects. If x is different from y (whether x is drink, the pleasure of drink, or being filled with drink), the appetite for x must be different from the appetite for y.

Powers and their accomplishments  59 that can be learned there is a distinct kind of epistêmê. As in the powers argument, different objects are correlated with different cognitive kinds. Furthermore, these examples point in favor of the starkest reading of Distinct Objects, and against the moderate view. There is no suggestion that the accomplishments of distinct powers might share objects: surely an accomplishment of the power of house-building is directed as exclusively toward house-building as is the power itself. Moreover, if the object cor­rel­ ated with the power of epistêmê is “what-can-be-learned,” where the ex­amples are things like building houses, it is extremely natural to take the object of the power to be just what the Content Overlap view denies: its subject matter, what it is about. We find a similar principle of objects-individuation at work in Plato’s discussions of particular epistêmai or crafts (technai). In several dialogues Socrates argues that some practice is not a craft, or not an epistêmê, on the grounds that this practice does not have its own special domain. For ex­ample, in the Gorgias Socrates presses Gorgias to say what power rhetoric has, on the assumption that if it is a craft it must have some power (Gorgias 447c);15 the ensuing discussion eliminates various accounts on the grounds that they do not specify a unique province for rhetoric—they fail to identify the unique thing that it is about (peri, 449d, 451d). As Benson puts it, in his discussion of cognitive powers, “the assumption that underlies this stretch of the dialogue is that since rhetoric is an expertise and so a dunamis, there is some special object associated with it—what it is ‘about’ – and by which it can be distinguished from other dunameis” (Benson 2000, 202). Note that again the distinguishing object is the object of the accomplishment as much as of the power (the question shifts from what rhetoric is about to what particular rhetorical speeches are about (see 451d)), and also that it is very natural to take the correlated objects as subject-matters, what rhetoric is about.16 The same theory is suggested by the brief discussion of sophistry at 15  Is it significant that epistêmê and doxa in the passages we have reviewed are powers, while craft here has a power? I doubt that it is, especially since Plato elsewhere sometimes says that craft is a power, and sometimes that epistêmê has a power (for good discussion see Benson 2000). Even in the midst of the Republic’s powers argument, where he identifies doxa and epistêmê as powers, Plato also speaks of “the power of each” (477b). 16  It is worth noting that we get a somewhat different picture in a passage discussing rhet­ oric as a power, in the Phaedrus. Here Socrates claims that in determining the nature (phusis) of anything, we must investigate “what power it has, to do what in relation to [pros] what, or to undergo what by the agency of what?” (σκοπεῖν τὴν δύναμιν αὐτοῦ, τίνα πρὸς τί πέφυκεν εἰς τὸ δρᾶν ἔχον ἢ τίνα εἰς τὸ παθεῖν ὑπὸ τοῦ. Phaedrus 270d)). This looks a good deal like Republic V’s formula, with “do or undergo” corresponding to “accomplish.” When Socrates applies the formula to rhetoric, however, he implies that its correlated object is the soul (it is the power to

60 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology the start of the Protagoras (312c–e). Painters, carpenters and harp-players each make their students clever at speaking about the particular things about which they themselves have epistêmê (peri houper epistasthai, 312e): that is, each species of epistêmê has its own particular domain, and this is its subject matter—the subject of its typical speeches. The Ion offers a similar argument about rhapsody, and the same assumptions are prominent here too: each epistêmê has its own domain, about which it is able to speak well (Ion 537c–538a)—that is, its own subject matter (cf. Laches 199a). (For further discussion see Section 4.) This is far from an exhaustive survey of Plato’s treatment of powers and their relation to their objects. I suspect that such a study would reveal that he does not have a thoroughly consistent theory. In some places he may countenance overlap between the objects of different powers. Moreover, he sometimes characterizes the objects of the powers as properties or aspects of other objects—colors, sounds, the pleasant, the fearful—while at other times he characterizes the objects as practices (building houses), or as substances (bodies, for medicine). What I hope to have shown, however, is that he often works with one particular view of powers on which they are individuated by their objects. Furthermore, when he makes use of this theory, he individuates cognitive powers (epistêmai, doxa, crafts, rhetoric) by the objects in the world with which they are concerned, i.e., their subject matters. Returning now to the powers argument in Republic V, we see that when Socrates ignores the possibility that two powers could do different things to the same object, he is not making a careless mistake, but instead relying on a developed theory. Powers are correlated one-to-one with their objects; thus distinct powers must be the powers to relate in distinct ways to distinct objects. Plato would not accept that animal husbandry and butchery take the same object (Fine’s example (1990, 220)), any more than he would accept that sight and hearing take the same object; instead, he would define the object of each more narrowly. (Perhaps husbandry is of animal wellbeing by contrast with animal flesh.) Each power is the power to do some activity φ in relation to some object f, where f is defined so narrowly that φ-ing is the activity uniquely suited to it.

produce persuasion in the soul, Phaedrus 271e)—the thing it affects, rather than as implied in the Gorgias its subject matter—although see Gorgias 463b for a similar claim: rhetoric is over (epi) the soul.

Powers and their accomplishments are defined  61 Thus we should positively expect Plato to do just what he does in this passage, namely identify two distinct kinds of object for epistêmê and doxa. Just as hearing is concerned with one kind of thing and sight with another, or just as medicine is concerned with one kind of thing and rhetoric with another, so epistêmê is concerned with one kind of thing, and doxa with another.

2.  Powers and their accomplishments are defined by their objects Why would someone construe powers, their accomplishments, and their objects as so closely correlated? Perhaps because they are thinking of these things as somehow inter-defined, essentially related to one another. As I mentioned in Chapter 1, that is a view we find in Plato’s student, Aristotle. Here again is Aristotle’s claim: If one must say what each of these is, for example what is the thinking [power] or the perceiving or the nutritive [power], it must first be said what thinking is and what perceiving is. For the activities and the actions are prior in account to the powers. And if this is so, and prior still to these the corresponding objects must be studied, one must first define these, for the same reason [i.e. that they are prior in account], for example about nourishment and the perceptible and the thinkable.17 (Aristotle, De Anima 415a16–22)

Here, as in the Republic’s powers argument, we can distinguish a power by looking to (a) something that it does (for Plato, “what it accomplishes”; for Aristotle, its activity, energeia, later referred to as its erga, products or accomplishments (402b9–16)), and (b) some object to which it is specially related (for Plato, “what it is over”; for Aristotle, its correlate, antikeimenon). On Aristotle’s version, the claim clearly concerns not just how to recognize different powers, but how to define them. Both activity and object are “prior in account” to the power, and the object is prior in account to the

17  εἰ δὲ χρὴ λέγειν τί ἕκαστον αὐτῶν, οἷον τί τὸ νοητικὸν ἢ τὸ αἰσθητικὸν ἢ τὸ θρεπτικόν, πρότερον ἔτι λεκτέον τί τὸ νοεῖν καὶ τί τὸ αἰσθάνεσθαι. πρότεραι γάρ εἰσι τῶν δυνάμεων αἱ ἐνέργειαι καὶ αἱ πράξεις κατὰ τὸν λόγον. . . . ἔτι πρότερα τὰ ἀντικείμενα . . . οἷον περὶ τροφῆς καὶ αἰσθητοῦ καὶ νοητοῦ.

62 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology activity. Aristotle elsewhere explains this relation as follows: if A is prior in account to B, then the definition of B includes a reference to A, but not vice versa (Metaphysics 1028a34–6; cf. 1049b12–17 on the priority of activity over power). The claim is metaphysical, not semantic: what it is to be B is to be something involving A.18 Thus powers and activities are ultimately defined by their objects: they are what they are because the object is what it is. What it is to be a certain power is to be the power to do a certain activity, φ-ing, and what it is to φ is to do the kind of thing that can be done in relation to a certain kind of object, f. He later gives us a clear application of this principle regarding perception: It is the proper perceptibles [color, sound, etc.]…in relation to which the being of each sense is by nature.19 (De Anima 418a24–5)

It is not just that sight can (strictly) perceive only color, it is that the power of sight is in essence something related to color: it is the power to see colors. Likewise, the earlier passage (415a16–22) implies, the power of nutrition is in essence something related to nutrition, and the power of intellection is in essence something related to intelligibles. Each power is what it is because it is the power to act on, or be acted on by—let us say “relate to” to allow for both cases—its particular kind of object. (Johansen brings out the implication of these claims nicely by arguing that the objects are the formal causes of the activities: “it is colour that makes vision the sort of perceptual suffering it is . . . and such defining is the proper work of the formal cause” (2012, 98).) Thus Aristotle not only directs us to discriminate powers by their objects, as Plato does, but offers a metaphysical rationale for this procedure. Could Plato have the same rationale in mind? Indeed he comes close to an explicit statement of it in the argument we saw in Republic IV: each appetite is related to “what it is of by nature” (houper pephuken) (437e). One cannot thirst for food, because thirst is by its nature an appetite for drink. Appetites—which, as we saw, the Charmides treats as powers—belong to the class of “things that are such as to be of something” (toiauta hoia einai tou, Republic 438a–b). The object is built into 18  For one interpretation of priority in account, and its relation to what Aristotle calls “priority in being,” see Peramatzis 2011. 19  πρὸς ἅ ἡ οὐσία πέφυκεν ἑκάστης αἰσθήσεως. Hicks’ commentary elaborates: “Each sense is by nature so constituted as to be affected by, and to perceive, its special objects” (1907, 364, comment ad loc.)

Powers and their accomplishments are defined  63 the definition of the power; to be that power is to be the power to relate to that kind of object. In this way powers are like the greater, lesser, more, fewer, double, and half. Plato is here clearly sketching out a theory of relational entities, a theory Aristotle will develop in detail (Categories 7).20 Returning with this in mind to the Charmides’ list of powers and objects, it is extremely natural to see the same principle at work in their pairings. Plato’s thought is not that sight simply happens to be of colors, or fear of the terrible, but instead that sight is by its nature exercised on colors and these alone, while fear is by its nature a response to the terrible and this alone, and so on. As Carone puts it, “What Socrates seems to be suggesting for the first time in the Charmides, and then Plato elaborating in the Republic, is what we might call some kind of ‘theory of intentionality’ by which every mental faculty is individuated and defined by its own distinctive object.”21 I can imagine someone protesting that Plato is aiming instead at a merely formal point about powers and objects: the power of φ-ing is by definition exercised in relation to something φ-able. This would tell us nothing im­port­ant about the power: it is a mere tautology. It is consistent with an account on which the power can be exercised in relation to any kind of thing whatsoever; what renders something φ-able is simply that someone φs it. What Aristotle offers in De Anima II.4 is clearly something very different. An account on which the power and its exercise are the way they are because the object is the way it is requires a substantive characterization of the object—a definition that is independent of the power. As Aristotle puts it elsewhere, “sight is sight of something, but not of that of which sight is (although it is true to say this), but in relation to color or something else like that” (Metaphysics 1021a33–b2). Indeed, in the rest of the de Anima he goes on to give substantive characterizations of each power’s object. Let us call accounts that explain powers in this way objects-based: they define powers in terms of objects that can be substantively characterized on their own terms, independently of the powers. When Plato individuates powers by their objects, which kind of account does he have in mind? We have seen that he sometimes gives tautologous characterizations of the objects, but he clearly thinks there are substantive 20  Plato’s goal here is to argue that unqualified relata are related to unqualified relata, while qualified relata are related to qualified ones; for example thirst itself is of drink itself, while much thirst is for much drink. What I wish to emphasize however is the more general point: some things, evidently including powers of the soul, are essentially relational. 21  Carone 2001, 119–20; cf. Kamtekar 2009.

64 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology characterizations to be had. To take an example we saw above, although he sometimes refers to the object of sight merely as the visible (horaton), he elsewhere makes clear that there is a particular kind of thing on which sight is specially suited to act: color.22 Likewise for desire: rather than characterizing desire’s object as whatever is desired, he holds that there are certain things whose nature renders them such as to be desired: appetite is only of the pleasant rather than of anything else; erôs is only of the beautiful (Charmides 167e); wish is of the good (Charmides 167e, Gorgias 468c). Plato evidently thinks there is a substantive account to be given of the objects of perception and of desire. What about cognitive powers? Again, he sometimes offers tautologous characterizations of their objects: in the Charmides, doxa is of what doxai are of (hôn doxai doxazousin), and epistêmê of what-can-be-learned (to mathêma) (168a); in Republic V, epistêmê is of the object of gnôsis (gnôston), doxa of its object (doxaston) (478b); later epistêmê is of the object of noêsis (noêton) (509d with 511d). If this were all he said, those wishing to assimilate Plato’s epistemology to the modern way of doing things could take heart. When he says that epistêmê and doxa are set over different things, they could argue, Plato means to make a merely formal point: that when you have doxa about something you thereby render it an object of doxa, and likewise for epistêmê. On this picture there would be no special quality some entity or domain needs to be the object of epistêmê, nor of doxa, and Overlap is possible. Yet there are ample signs that Plato has in mind something stronger. Consider—as we will in much more detail in the next chapters—his frequent characterizations of the object of epistêmê as what is or being, and of the object of doxa as becoming, or what is between being and not-being, or as the visible. We will have to figure out what these descriptions mean, but one thing should already be clear: these are substantive characterizations; they make no reference to the powers. This encourages us to take the tautologous characterizations as superficial. When Plato says for example that epistêmê is of the intelligible (to ­noêton), the claim is not that whatever we turn our epistêmê toward thereby becomes its object, but rather that there is something in the nature of ­certain things which makes them accessible to intellect by contrast with perception, and epistêmê is by its nature related to this kind of thing. (Indeed, even the claim that epistêmê is of “what-can-be-learned” (to mathêma) may sound to 22  Many philosophers nowadays deny that color and sound are metaphysically independent of sight and hearing, but Plato, like Aristotle, thought they were.

Powers and their accomplishments are defined  65 Plato’s ear much more of a substantive-object characterization than it does to ours. ‘Mathêma’ is a familiar label for highly structured domains such as geometry or architecture, what we might call sciences. In naming this as the object of epistêmê, therefore, Plato plausibly means to be saying something substantive: epistêmê by its nature can only be of structured, systematic domains.)23 I am arguing that Plato holds that there is something special about certain objects that suits them to be cognized in certain ways. Just as there is some feature in the nature of certain things that makes them digestible and some other feature that makes things visible, so there is some feature in the nature of certain things that makes them suitable for epistêmê to grasp, and some other feature that makes things available instead to doxa. I am here following Gerson, a strong defender of the view that Plato held an objectsbased epistemology: “the question of what is knowable is . . . a question of . . . finding out what something must be like to be knowable, that is, to be able to put us in the real state of knowing” (2009, 7). If this idea sounds too strange to attribute to Plato, it should help to note that Aristotle certainly seems to have held it. For as I will now show, he very clearly applies the De Anima’s objects-based account of psychological ­powers to the cognitive domain. In a passage we saw in Chapter  1 (Nicomachean Ethics 1139a6–12), Aristotle gives a Distinct Objects account of two rational parts of the soul (where parts are characterized with the same suffix used in de Anima for powers, -ikon). One is called the part capable of epistêmê (epistêmonikon); the other Aristotle refers to first as the part capable of calculation (logistikon) or deliberation (bouleutikon), and later as the part capable of doxa (doxastikon), on the grounds that doxa, like deliberation, is concerned with “things that can be otherwise.”24 Aristotle motivates this psychological distinction via a distinction in objects: Let it be laid down that there are two parts that have logos, one by which we contemplate those things whose principle do not admit of being otherwise, one by which we contemplate those [whose principles] do admit of 23  I mean this description of mathêmata only as a rough characterization; we will get much more information about what sorts of things can be the objects of epistêmê in Chapters 3–4. 24  “Since there are two parts of the soul that have logos, [practical wisdom] must be the ­virtue of the second, the doxastikon: for both doxa and practical wisdom are about what can be otherwise” (Nicomachean Ethics 1140b25–8). What Aristotle here calls the doxastikon must be the very same second logos-having part that he earlier called the logistikon, the part responsible for thoughts about what can be otherwise, including practical thought.

66 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology being otherwise: for in relation to things different in kind, so the part of the soul related to each is different in kind. (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 1139a6–10)

There is a division in nature between necessary things like the truths of mathematics or theology and contingent things like individual actions or objects. Corresponding to this division is an epistemological one: the former are cognized by the epistemonic part of the soul, the latter by the calculative or deliberative part, also known as doxastic. That is, the former are objects of epistêmê, the latter of doxa.25 The object of epistêmê differs in kind from the object of doxa, just as the object of sight differs from the object of hearing, and therefore the power (and presumably, as in our De Anima passage above, the activity) of epistêmê differs from that of doxa. Cognitive powers are tailored to specific objects; the powers are distinct because their objects are distinct. We find similar claims repeated at length in the Magna Moralia— evidence if not of Aristotle’s views then of later Peripatetics’. Here the author argues for a distinction between the parts responsible for epistêmê and for phronêsis (practical wisdom) on the grounds that their objects are distinct. (This time there is no mention of doxa, but the argument is nonetheless a striking example of a Distinct Objects epistemology, where the distinction is between theoretical and practical thought.) Here the identity of the objects is very clear: just as in Plato’s Two Worlds dialogues, the distinction is between intelligibles and perceptibles.26 Moreover, the author uses the same analogy we see in the Republic’s powers argument, between the relations cognitive powers bear to their objects and the relation perceptual powers bear to theirs: [That the deliberative and epistemonic parts are distinct] will be evident from their objects [tôn hupokeimenôn]. For just as color, flavor, sound and smell are different from each other, so too nature has given different senses

25  Or at least of the doxastikon. If this is the same as the logistikon, does all practical and technical reasoning result in doxa? This would be an ill fit with Aristotle’s distinctions between doxa and the good exercise of practical and theoretical reasoning (phronêsis and technê). 26  In Chapter 1 we considered a passage from Posterior Analytics I.33 in which epistêmê and doxa are distinguished by being about different kinds of proposition. I mentioned that even there, the implication is that the objects are different. The passage from Nicomachean Ethics is almost explicit that objects are at issue (see discussion in Chapter 1). The present passage, from the Magna Moralia, is simply unequivocal.

Powers and Accomplishments  67 for them (for we cognize [gnôrizomen] sound by hearing, flavor by taste, color by sight), likewise we must suppose it to be the same way in other cases. Where the objects [hupokeimena] are different, different too are the parts of the soul by which we cognize them. Now the intelligible [noêton] and the perceptible [aisthêton] are different, and we cognize these things through the soul. Therefore [ara] the part of the soul concerned with [peri] perceptibles [viz., the deliberative part] must be different from the part concerned with intelligibles [the epistemonic part]. The deliberative and deciding part is concerned with things that are perceptible and changing, and simply with all things that come to be and pass away. (Magna Moralia 1196b15–29, emphasis added)

Nature fits us with different powers tailored to different objects. Because unchangeable things are different from changing ones, we have two different cognitive powers to cognize them. We have thus seen explicit evidence that Aristotle’s epistemology is objects-based, and strong indications that Plato’s is as well. Powers and their accomplishments are individuated by their objects because they are defined by their objects: each power is, in its essence, the power to relate to a certain kind of thing. In the next section I will argue that we get confirmation of this interpretation from the fact that both Plato and Aristotle also held a stronger view, one that provides a rationale for this one. Cognitive powers and their accomplishments are tailored to their objects by virtue of resembling these objects: cognition operates on the principle Aristotle calls “like-by-like.”

3.  Powers and their accomplishments resemble their objects: cognition of like-by-like In the very next lines of the discussion quoted above from the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle offers an explanation for why there is a different cognitive power for each kind of objects: In relation to things different in kind [genei], so the part of the soul related to each is different in kind, since indeed cognition [gnôsis] belongs to the parts by virtue of some likeness and kinship [homoiotêta kai oikeiotêta]. (Nicomachean Ethics 1139a8–11, emphases added)

Each cognitive power is uniquely suited to cognize its particular type of object by virtue of resembling that object in some way.

68 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology Although he does not draw the connection here, this view provides a strong rationale for the objects-based account of powers and activities we find in De Anima II.4, at least so far as cognition is concerned. The world is populated with various kinds of objects, which are the way they are independently of our cognizing them. Nature endows us with powers to cognize these objects, tailoring different powers to the different types of object. Since cognition works through resemblance, each power owes not only its existence but its particular character to its object. Thus if you want to understand the epistêmonikon, or its exercises, you will have to begin by understanding its objects—viz., things that cannot be otherwise—for the power and activity are the way they are due to their resembling those objects. Aristotle does not elaborate on the claim that cognition works through resemblance, but it is clear that he is endorsing some version of a view he elsewhere attributes to his predecessors: that “like is cognized by like” (De Anima 409b26–7).27 Aristotle takes this it to be a widespread view of cognition. There is one extremely clear case in a passage he quotes from Empedocles: With earth we see earth, with water water, with air bright air, but ravaging fire by fire, love by love, and strife by gruesome strife . . .  (Empedocles B 109, trans. R.D. Hicks)28

We cognize each kind of external phenomenon by the action of some qualitatively similar phenomenon within us.29 Aristotle attributes the same kind of view to Diogenes of Apollonia (soul cognizes external objects because both are made of air, De Anima 405a23), and to Heraclitus (because both are in motion, De Anima 405a27), among others. In de Anima II.5 and III.4, Aristotle himself develops a more complex view that nonetheless accepts the basic principle that like can be cognized only by like. Vision occurs when something in us that is already potentially like visible objects—the visual system—takes on the visible form of something and becomes actually like it, and likewise for the other senses; intellection (nous) happens when something that is potentially like intelligible objects—the noetic system—takes on the intelligible form of something and becomes actually like it. He does not tell us how to apply the like-by-like principle to Nicomachean Ethics VI.1’s distinction between the epistemonic 27  γνωρίζειν τῷ ὁμοίῳ τὸ ὅμοιον. 28  Hicks 1907, 13–15. 29  Aristotle characterizes Empedocles’ view as being strictly materialistic (De Anima I.5), but the inclusion of Love and Strife casts doubt on this interpretation.

Powers and Accomplishments  69 and doxastic parts of the soul, and it is difficult to see how this would work; perhaps the idea would be that the epistemonic part is potentially like unchanging things, and thus capable of taking on their intelligible forms, and likewise for the doxastic part with changing things (a view similar to what I attribute to Plato below). At any rate, the account he gives in de Anima shows that Nicomachean Ethics VI.1’s remark about cognition working through likeness and kinship is far from casual. Thus both Plato’s predecessors and his student held versions of the likeby-like view of cognition. Did Plato himself? Evidently Aristotle thought so. He argues in de Anima that psychologists who want to account for cognition and perception (to ginôskein kai to aisthanesthai) say that the soul is composed of the first principles (archai)—that is, the things of which everything else is composed. His first example is Empedocles (the passage given above). He continues: In the same way, Plato in the Timaeus makes the soul from the elements, for like is cognized by like [gignôskesthai gar tôi homoiôi to homoion], and [external] things are made up of the first principles. Similarly, in the work On Philosophy he defined the world-animal as made up of the idea of the One and of the primary length, primary breadth, primary depth, and similarly with all the rest. And furthermore he put it in another way: nous is the One; epistêmê the Two…; doxa is the number of the primary surface, Three; and perception the number of a solid, Four . . . Some things are judged by nous, some by epistêmê, some by doxa, some by perception . . .   (Aristotle, De Anima 404b16–27, translastion based on Hicks)

What should we make of this? The claim about the Timaeus is clear enough: in this dialogue, the character Timaeus puts forth a straightforward Empedoclean account of sensory perception on which it is through fire in the eyes that we see external fire. Whether this is meant as Plato’s own view of perception is unclear, but certainly it is a like-by-like theory. Of more relevance for our purposes, Aristotle may have had in mind another passage from the Timaeus too, where commentators from Proclus to the present day have found the like-by-like doctrine:30

30  See citations in Cornford, who agrees (1935, 64–65 and 94). Hicks, in his commentary on De Anima 404b17, refers to this passage of the Timaeus as evidence for the like-by-like view in Plato: “Plato with his immaterial principles gives a wholly original application to the maxim ‘like is known by like’ ” (Hicks 1907, 222).

70 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology Seeing, then, that the [World-] soul had been blended of Sameness, Difference, and Being . . . whenever she is in contact with anything . . . she is set in motion all through herself and tells in what respect precisely, and how, and in what sense, and when, it comes about that something is qualified as either the same or different with respect to any given thing, whatever it may be . . . Whenever logos . . . is about that which is perceptible, and the circle of the Different, moving aright, carries its message throughout all its soul – then there arise doxai and pisteis stable and true. But whenever logos is concerned with the calculating, and the circle of the Same, running smoothly, declares it, the result must be nous and epistêmê. (Timaeus 37a–c, based on Cornford’s translation)

The argument is difficult to decipher, but commentators have taken the idea to be as follows: because the World-soul is composed of the same basic elem­ents as Forms and perceptibles—Being, the Same, and the Different—it can cognize these things, cognizing the Different in them by means of the Different within it, and the Same in them by means of the Same within it. Moreover, the result when the objects are perceptibles is doxa, when they are intelligible, epistêmê. Here then we have evidence for a Platonic like-bylike view of epistêmê and doxa, although arguably one confined to the Timaeus, premised as it is on the dialogue’s mythical cosmogony. As to Aristotle’s claims about On Philosophy, we have very little to go on—this is an otherwise unattested work, and the Pythagorean doctrine here described is found nowhere else in Plato—but we can discern a basic picture. Just as in Empedocles’ or Timaeus’ theory of perception, cognition works because the same “first principles” compose both the soul and external objects: not now fire and air, but numbers. It is by the One in the soul that we cognize the One in the world, and so on. What is significant about this doctrine for our purposes is that, like that of Timaeus 37a–c, it applies the like-by-like theory of cognition to doxa and epistêmê. Just as vision cognizes what is vision-like out in the world, so nous cognizes what is like nous-like out in the world, and the same for epistêmê and doxa. Thus whatever his evidence, Aristotle finds in Plato a view of cognitive powers broadly similar to the one he himself endorses in Nicomachean Ethics VI.1: cognitive kinds are correlated with distinct objects because cognition is of like-by-like. I want to show that Aristotle was on the right track. Although the idea has received relatively little attention in studies of Plato’s epistemology, there is ample evidence—and much of it clearer and more systematic than what we have just seen—that Plato thinks epistêmê and doxa work on the

Powers and Accomplishments  71 ­prin­ciple of like-by-like.31 Moreover, the doctrine applies both to powers and to their accomplishments. Here is a rough sketch, to be filled in below. There is a sharp qualitative distinction between Forms and perceptibles. Forms are what I will call, for shorthand, clean: they are stable, clear, and precise; perceptibles by contrast are what I will call messy: unstable, obscure, and imprecise. Moreover, there is something in us—either the soul as a whole (Phaedo 79a–d) or a special component of it (Republic 490b)—that resembles the Forms in being clean, and therefore can cognize them. There is also something in us that resembles perceptibles in being messy, and therefore can cognize them. (This latter claim is explicit in the Phaedo, where the job goes to the body (79a–c); the Republic makes no explicitly equivalent claim, but it is natural to supply the power of doxa for the role; I return to this issue below.) Call this Stage 1. Finally, when we actually cognize the Forms our souls become even cleaner; when we actually cognize perceptibles our souls become messier; actual contact with the objects increases the resemblance. The clean condition that results from cognizing Forms is occurrent epistêmê; the messy condition that results from cognizing perceptibles is doxa (where Plato perhaps conceives of these as activities, perhaps as states). Call this Stage 2. Now for the evidence. That Plato characterizes both Forms and epistêmê as clean, and both perceptibles and doxa as messy, is beyond question. Forms are always in every way the same, while perceptibles change and are infected with contradictory properties (Republic 479a–c, 524a, 529d–530b, Phaedo 74b–c, 78e, 79c–d, Symposium 210e–211b; cf. Philebus 59a–c, where Plato sums up the point by saying that perceptibles have no stability (bebaiotêta)). Perceptibles are more obscure than Forms (skotôdestera, Republic 479c); Forms have more clarity (saphêneia) (509d); Forms are most precise (akribestata) (implied at Republic 529d). Likewise, epistêmê is stable or steadfast (bebaios, monimos) while doxa is unstable (Meno 98a, Philebus 59b, and the Platonic Definitions 414b–c; cf. Republic 484b, and Protagoras 356d–e);32 epistêmê is clear (saphês) and doxa is unclear (Republic 511e, Philebus 58c–59d); epistêmê is precise (akribês) and doxa imprecise

31  A handful of commentators on Aristotle have noted that Plato holds some version of the like-by-like view: see for example Hicks’ commentary on De Anima 404b17–27 (noted in the previous note), and Joachim’s on Nicomachean Ethics 1139a. David Ebrey (forthcoming) has a very good discussion of the kinship between the soul and the Forms. 32  Although at Timaeus 37b, true doxa is stable. I take the claim to be that this doxa, belonging as it does to the World-Soul, has as much stability as doxa can have—which, given its objects, is not perfect stability, but relative stability. See discussion in Chapter 4.5.

72 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology (Philebus 58c–59d). What Plato means by these characterizations is less clear. I will have a bit more to say in Chapters 4 and 7; for present purposes I wish only to emphasize that Plato does attribute cleanness and messiness both to cognitive kinds and to their objects. Indeed he sometimes explicitly emphasizes this similarity, and spells out to some extent how it allows for cognition. Consider a passage we saw in Chapter 1 as evidence for Distinct Objects: Phaedo 79c–80b.33 The Forms are invisible, immortal, uniform, and unchanging; perceptibles are the op­pos­ite. Our bodies, the part by which we cognize perceptibles,34 is “more like and akin” to them than it is to Forms (homoioteron kai sungenesteron, 79b), while our soul, the part of us that grasps the Forms, is “more like and akin” to them (79e). These are the key terms that describe cognition of ­like-by-like at Nicomachean Ethics 1139a11, and this is clearly a similar doctrine: we cognize each type of thing by means of some part of us akin to that type.35 This is Stage 1. Moreover, when we are actively cognizing, the resemblance grows stronger (Stage 2): [T]he soul, whenever it makes use of the body for investigating something . . . is dragged by the body toward the things that are never the same, and itself wanders and is confused and is dizzy as if drunk, because it is having contact with things of that sort36…But whenever it investigates itself by itself, it passes toward what is pure and always being and deathless and always the same, and since it is akin to it, it always is with it, whenever it is itself by itself and is able to, and it has ceased its wandering and remains always in the same state, because it is having contact with things of that sort. (Phaedo 79c–d, italics mine)

Not only does the soul already resemble the Forms, but by attending to them it comes to resemble them still more, becoming more stable; not only

33  In his De Anima commentary Shields recognizes this passage as evidence for the doctrine of like-by-like (comment ad 409b24–5); cf. Ebrey (forthcoming). 34  Or more precisely, that through which the soul cognizes perceptibles; the soul cognizes Forms all by itself. 35  See also Gallop’s commentary ad loc; on his interpretation Plato is also appealing to the converse of the doctrine, that unlike cannot be cognized (well) by unlike: “The soul’s know­ ledge of the unvarying Forms shows its likeness to them; its confusion when it is in contact with varying sensibles shows that it is unlike them” (1975, 140). 36  ἅτε τοιούτων ἐφαπτομένη. ἅτε has clear causal force; it is often translated “inasmuch as” or “seeing that.”

Powers and Accomplishments  73 does the body already resemble perceptibles, but by attending to them through the body, the soul is infected with the resemblance, becoming more unstable. Moreover, the stable condition inherited from contact with Forms is phronêsis (79d)—the word here seems to play the role of the Republic’s ‘epistêmê’ or ‘noêsis,’ denoting an intellectual grasp of Forms—and the unstable condition, Plato strongly implies, is doxa (see Phaedo 83c–84a, discussed in Chapter 1.2). So here we have a full like-by-like theory: as on the classic Empedoclean view, cognition happens by something in us acting on external objects which it resembles (Stage 1), and the resulting cognitive conditions further resemble those objects (Stage 2). We find another version of the view in the Republic. Here too there is something in us that has a special resemblance to Forms, and for that reason enables us to cognize the Forms. It is not this time the soul simpliciter, but one aspect of it: It is the nature of the real lover of learning to struggle toward what is, and not to remain over [epi] each of the many things that are opined to be [doxazomenois],37 as he moves on . . . until he grasps the Being of each nature itself with that of his soul which it befits to grasp this kind of thing – it befits that which is akin38 . . .[and begets] nous and truth. (Republic 490a–b, translation based on Grube/Reeve, emphases added)

This is clearly a Stage 1 like-by-like view, although the passage leaves open several questions about how it works. First, which part of the soul is Plato here describing as akin to the Forms: the whole rational part of the soul (logistikon), or some specific component of it? Second, and related, is this the same thing by which we cognize perceptibles, or is that some other part which is akin instead to them—perhaps the body, as in the Phaedo, or the non-rational parts of the soul, or the power of doxa? Certainly Plato implies that the very same part of us can either be turned toward Forms and generate epistêmê, or toward perceptibles and generate doxa: see Republic 508d, where doxa and epistêmê are both operations of “that of the soul by which it thinks [noei],” and Republic 518c, where the “eye of the soul” can be turned either toward perceptibles or toward Forms. Indeed, the Phaedo view is not so different: it is one and the same thing, the soul, that cognizes both Forms 37  Or, “each of the things that are opined to be many.” I use ‘opined’ here from failure to find a better idiomatic way to translate. 38  ᾧ προσήκει ψυχῆς ἐφάπτεσθαι τοῦ τοιούτου, προσήκει δὲ συγγενενεῖ.

74 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology and perceptibles; the difference is that it cognizes Forms by itself, and ­perceptibles through the body (Phaedo 79c). Given that Plato has earlier in the Republic argued that epistêmê and doxa are each the operation of a different power (478a–b), I suggest the following interpretation: Plato thinks that we have something in us, the rational part of the soul, which he sometimes refers to as a power, but which itself has several powers. When it is turned toward perceptibles it exercises its power of doxa; when it is turned toward Forms it exercises its power of epistêmê.39 It is as a whole the part of us most similar to the Forms, and therefore its true or best function is to cognize these. But insofar as it has the power of doxa it also resembles perceptibles. (Perhaps, as in the Phaedo, it has the power to cognize perceptibles only because it is embodied, and it is the body that is the direct source of resemblance to perceptibles.) This is however a speculation; I think the text leaves it underdetermined, and suspect that Plato had not fully worked out his view here. Second, the Republic is far less explicit than the Phaedo about the basis of resemblance to the Forms. Is the claim again that the relevant part is stable, immortal, divine? Arguably this is what Plato has in mind: toward the end of the dialogue he strongly implies that the rational part of the soul alone is “akin” (sungenês) to the divine, immortal, and eternal (Republic 611e). At any rate, this passage clearly presents Stage 1 of a like-by-like doctrine of cognition: there is a part of us specially suited to grasp the Forms because it resembles them. The Republic is very explicit about Stage 2. When we actually contemplate Forms, we take on a condition that resembles them in being stable and clear, and that condition is called epistêmê. When we actually attend to perceptibles, we take on a condition that resembles them in being unstable and murky, and that condition is called doxa. We have seen evidence of this already in Chapter 1, from a claim Plato makes in the course of the Sun ana­logy. Just as when our eyes are turned on dim things they cannot see well, but when they are turned toward well-lit things they see clearly (saphôs), so too: Whenever [that part of the soul by which we think] is fixed on that on which truth and being shine [the Forms], it understands and knows it and 39  (For a roughly similar view see Szaif 2007.) Although Plato’s tripartite theory of the soul is not my focus in this work, I will briefly note that he seems to attribute doxa to all three parts of the soul in the Republic (see Moss 2008 for one defense). Just as each part has its own desires, each part has its own doxai; the rational part is however unique in also having the power of epistêmê.

Powers and Accomplishments  75 appears to have intelligence, but whenever it [is fixed on] that which is mixed with darkness, that which comes to be and passes away, it has doxa and is weak-sighted, shifting its doxai back and forth.40   (Republic 508d)

Attention to obscure and shifty perceptibles makes our souls engage in the activity of having doxa, which activity makes the soul itself obscure (“weaksighted”) and shifty (changing its views). Attention to the truth-illuminated Forms makes us instead engage in the activity of noêsis and gnôsis; the ana­ logy with vision, and the contrast with doxa, strongly imply that this involves our minds themselves being stable and clear rather than shifty and obscure. At Stage 2, our cognitive condition inherits its properties directly from its objects. This is confirmed shortly afterward in the Divided Line passage’s cor­rel­ ation of cognitive conditions with objects: as the clarity of objects increases, so does the clarity of the cognition.41 More elaborately: the upper section has more clarity (saphênia) than the lower (509d), and also more truth (alêtheia, 510a); after listing the four conditions (pathêmata) of soul, each set over (epi) a section of the line, Socrates says “to the extent that the things they are set over share in truth, so do these share in clarity” (511e).). The implication is that, as at 508d, the cognitive conditions have the degree of clarity they have because their objects do. (This causal claim is confirmed by the Cave allegory: because one moves from attending to shadows to attending to statues and so on, one’s cognitive condition improves from eikasia to pistis and so on.) We find a very explicit statement of this Stage 2 inheritance view in the Philebus’ ranking of cognitive kinds. (Confusingly, Plato here treats various crafts (technai) as lowly species of epistêmê, describing what he would elsewhere call epistêmê as the highest kind. This is not however such a de­part­ ure from his usual practice: we have seen that even in the Republic he sometimes joins popular usage in using ‘epistêmê’ to label crafts like carpentry, house-building, or flute-playing (428b–c, 438d, 601e–602a).) Here too he distinguishes a lowly messy cognitive condition from a lofty clean one, and here too he traces this difference to a corresponding difference in their objects. After stating that true epistêmê is clear, stable, and precise (Philebus

40  ἐνόησέν τε καὶ ἔγνω. . . . δοξάζει τε καὶ ἀμβλυώττει ἄνω καὶ κάτω τὰς δόξας μεταβάλλον. 41  I am here treating the cognitive terms in the Line passage as referring to exercises rather than powers—something at Stage 2. I think this is warranted by the text; if it is wrong, however, then we can take these like-by-like claims as referring to Stage 1.

76 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology 58a–c), Socrates argues that one can have no such epistêmê about perceptibles, which admit only of doxa: Most arts, and the men who devote themselves to them, make use of doxai and persistently investigate things which have to do with opinion [ta peri doxan]. And even if they think they are studying nature, they are spending their lives in the study of the things of this world . . . Such thinkers, then, toil to discover, not what always is [ta onta aei], but what becomes [gignomena] and has become and will become?…And can we say anything clear [saphes] about these things, with most precise truth, since none of them ever was, will be, or is in the same state?. . . How could we ever get anything stable [bebaion] about things that have no stability?…Therefore one can have no nous nor epistêmê possessed of the highest truth about these things.  (Philebus 58e–59b, emphases added)

The study of things that come to be and pass away (ta gignomena), rather than of what is (ta onta), yields only doxa rather than (the highest) epistêmê. This is due to a principle of like-by-like: if you attend to unstable objects, your cognitive condition cannot be a stable one; the stability of the cognitive condition depends on that of its objects. We find further confirmation in a much-discussed passage from the Timaeus. The explicit claim here is that there is a similarity between objects and the accounts (logoi) one can give of them, but there is a strong implication that the similarity extends to the cognitive conditions of people who give these accounts: Accounts are akin to the things they expound.42 Accounts of that which is fixed and stable and discoverable with the aid of nous will themselves be  fixed and unchangeable, so far as it is possible…; while accounts of what is made in the image of that other but is only a likeness [eikôn], will themselves be only likely [eikotas], standing to accounts of the former kind in a proportion [ana logon]: as Being is to Becoming, so is truth [alêtheia] to pistis. (Timaeus 29b–c)

When you grasp the stable world of Being, your cognitive condition, along with the accounts that issue from or secure it, are inevitably stable; when you are in touch instead with the world of Becoming, your cognitive state, 42  τοὺς λόγους, ὧνπέρ εἰσιν ἐξηγηταί, τούτων αὐτῶν καὶ συγγενεῖς ὄντας.

Powers and Accomplishments  77 along with the accounts that issue from or secure it, will resemble that world. Plato here characterizes this latter resemblance in terms of “likeliness,” rather than in terms of the familiar properties of messiness, but he may well mean to imply them; a similar passage in the Phaedo speaks explicitly of accounts in which there is nothing stable (bebaios, 90c). Moreover, although the present passage is about accounts, these are clearly expressions of cognitive conditions, and the claim here is quite similar to what we have seen just above: attention to qualitatively inferior things yields a qualitatively inferior cognitive condition, while attention to qualitatively superior things yields a qualitatively superior one. As a final piece of evidence that Plato endorses a view with both Stage 1 and Stage 2, consider the Timaeus’ discussion of becoming like the divine (90a–d). The rational part of the soul is that in us by which we can cognize Being, and once again this part is itself akin to the divine (90a), while the other parts are more akin to the mortal (Stage 1). Moreover, active attention to lowly perceptibles makes us more like them (here, more mortal (90b)), and also gives us doxa (here, dogmata, 90b) (Stage 2); if instead we engage in love of learning (philomathia) and true wisdom (phronêseis), we ourselves become as immortal as possible (90b–c). More specifically, if we nourish our intellect on the things that are most familiar and akin to it, it will become even more like them (Stage 2): There is one way tending to anything—namely, to supply each with its own proper [oikeias] food and motion; and for the divine part within us the kindred [sungenneis] motions are the intellections [dianoêseis] and revolutions of the Universe. These each one of us should follow, rectifying the revolutions within our head, which were distorted at our birth, by learning the harmonies and revolutions of the Universe, and thereby making the part that thinks be like the object of its thought, in accordance with its original nature.43 (Timaeus 90c–d, translation based on Lamb)

The best thing in us, which is already by nature akin to the best external objects, becomes even more like that by contemplating them. Two notes are in order before we sum up this view. First, in the case of epistêmê, the resemblance will not be complete, for surely not even the best human epistemic condition could be as stable as the Forms. (Indeed, one might protest that since we are embodied, changeable creatures, even our 43  τῷ κατανοουμένῳ τὸ κατανοοῦν ἐξομοιῶσαι κατὰ τὴν ἀρχαίαν φύσιν.

78 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology most stable achievements are more akin to certain perceptible things: the stability of human epistêmê is more like a rock’s than a Form’s.44) Plato argues however not for exact resemblance between cognitive kinds and objects, but instead for a proportionate analogy: in cleanliness, as Being is to Becoming, so epistêmê is to doxa (Republic 511d–e; cf. 534a). Second, Plato clearly holds that contact with Forms makes us resemble them not only in our cognitive condition but in our whole selves: we become more immortal (Timaeus 90c, Phaedo 84a–b), more ordered and more unchanging (Republic 500b–d). My focus here is only on cognitive conditions, but of course for Plato one’s cognitive condition has consequences for one’s psychological condition as a whole. I leave this issue for another occasion. What we have seen from these passages is that Plato holds a two-fold doctrine of cognition of like-by-like: cognition is enabled by something in us already resembling the object, and the exercise of cognition involves increased resemblance. I will now briefly show how this bears on an issue we have kept in mind throughout the chapter: the difference between cognitive powers and their exercises or accomplishments. Plato does not draw this distinction explicitly in any of the passages we have reviewed, but the two-fold nature of his like-by-like doctrine fits nicely with it. We have something in us which already resembles the Forms, and which enables us to cognize them—the soul (Phaedo), or a part of it (Republic, Timaeus). We also have, according to the Phaedo at least, something which already resembles perceptibles, and enables us to cognize them: the body (Phaedo 79a); perhaps Plato has in mind a similar view elsewhere. Thus there is something Form-like in us all the time that enables us to cognize Forms, and something perceptible-like in us all the time that enables us to cognize perceptibles (Stage 1). These things are naturally understood as cognitive powers, or parts that have powers: Plato after all defines a power (dunamis) as what makes us able (dunametha) to do whatever we are able to do (Republic 477c). Meanwhile the occurrent cognitions (Stage 2), the activities of actively attending to Forms or perceptibles, are well understood as accomplishments of those powers.45

44  I owe this objection to Gail Fine. 45  Thus Adam on Republic 508d: “The faculty of νοῦς is suddenly actualized into νόησις by being turned upon its proper object. . . Reason has hitherto lain dormant within” (1902, comment ad loc).

Distinct Objects confirmed  79 As to what the resemblances consist in, Plato seems to hold that the power of epistêmê, or perhaps more precisely the part of us which has that power, is divine and immortal like the Forms; in the Phaedo at least he holds that the part with the power of doxa, namely the body, is lowly and mortal like perceptibles, and perhaps he has some such view in the Republic too. It is much clearer that and how resemblance works in the case of the accomplishments. We have seen in Phaedo 79c–d, Republic 508d, and Philebus 59a–b descriptions of what happens during an actual instance of attention to perceptibles or Forms. Something in us takes on the character of the objects to which it is actively attending: when we contemplate Forms our soul takes on a clean condition, i.e. it has occurrent epistêmê; when we attend to perceptibles our soul takes on a messy condition, i.e. it has occurrent doxa. I will examine the nature of these qualities further in Chapters 4 and 7; for now, I simply emphasize that Plato repeatedly asserts that our cognitive accomplishments have these qualities, and inherit them from their objects. Perhaps Plato would accept Aristotle’s view that the powers potentially resemble their objects, while the active cognitions (accomplishments) actually do. At any rate it is clear that his like-by-like doctrine of cognition applies to both the powers of epistêmê and doxa and to their accomplishments. In examining the relation between these and their objects, then, I will from here on in mostly bracket the power/accomplishment distinction, and simply speak of cognitive kinds resembling their objects.

4.  Distinct Objects confirmed I have devoted so much attention to the like-by-like doctrine because Plato’s embrace of it confirms that he also held both the views we attributed to him above: cognitive kinds are individuated by their objects (the Distinct Objects view), and also defined by them. First, if cognition works on the principle of like-by-like, then cognitive kinds must be individuated by their objects: the like-by-like doctrine entails Distinct Objects. We saw this in Aristotle, who introduces the like-by-like doctrine to justify a Distinct Objects claim: different kinds of objects (“things whose principles cannot be otherwise” by contrast with things whose principles can) must be cognized by different things within us, “because cognition belongs to the parts by virtue of some likeness and kinship” (Nicomachean Ethics 1139a10–11). If Plato holds that cognitive kinds resemble their objects, and if he holds—as he so clearly does in the Two

80 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology Worlds dialogues—that the available objects are of two qualitatively ­different kinds, then he is committed to Distinct Objects. One cannot have epistêmê of perceptibles because there is nothing epistêmê-like there: nothing clear, precise, and stable. One cannot have doxa of intelligibles because there is nothing doxa-like there: nothing unclear, imprecise, changing. More elaborately: powers are able to cognize only what they resemble, so a clean power like epistêmê can get no grip at all on messy objects like perceptibles; cognitive accomplishments in turn resemble their objects, so the result of attending to perceptibles will be messy, and a fortiori will not be an instance of epistêmê. (Mutatis mutandis for doxa and Forms).46 This rules out Moderate Overlap views on which each cognitive kind has a natural, or normative, or constitutive domain (the power is set over different objects), but is able to act in some derivative or indirect way on the other’s domain (the accomplishments can overlap) (e.g. Kamtekar 2009, Harte 2018). It also begins to rule out Smith’s Content Overlap view, on which cognitive powers have distinct relata, understood as the objects they are exercised on, but the resulting accomplishments—occurrent cognitions—can be about the same things (see especially Smith 2000). For this view too involves drawing significant distinctions between the way powers are related to objects and the way that their accomplishments are related to objects. What we have seen in this chapter however undermines that strategy. When describing the relation between cognitive kinds and their objects, as indeed throughout most of his epistemological discussions, Plato makes no mention of the power/accomplishment distinction, nor does he clearly mark when he is talking about one by contrast with the other. I suggest then that in considering the relation between cognitive kinds and their objects, Plato did not think this distinction—let alone any finer-grained distinctions— significant.47 Cognitive kinds, both powers and their accomplishments, resemble their objects; therefore, both are individuated by their objects. 46  It is worth recalling that this view leaves open the possibility that the objects of epistêmê and doxa might be co-instantiated in the same things, as sight and color are: the same thing might have some properties that are grasped by epistêmê, others that are grasped by doxa. That is, the objects of epistêmê and doxa might be distinct without being separate. Arguably this is Aristotle’s view, as manifest especially in the Posterior Analytics’ claim that in a way the same thing can be the object of both (89a23–37). Perhaps in some places it is Plato’s too (see my discussion of the Meno in Chapter 9). In the Two Worlds dialogues, however, Plato’s metaphysics entails that the objects are not only distinct, but wholly separate. 47  Smith 2000 argues that powers have distinct objects (Forms for epistêmê, perceptibles for doxa), while the “cognitive states” they produce—roughly, beliefs—can share the same contents, i.e. have the same subject matter. His 2012 adds a new element: epistêmê and doxa as powers, operating on their distinct objects, each allow us to form “conceptions” of the same

Distinct Objects confirmed  81 Content Overlappers might argue that the accomplishments can be about different objects from those by which they are individuated: an episode of doxa, in which one confines one’s attention to perceptibles, is nonetheless about the underlying Forms. This is undermined by what we saw in ­Section 1: Plato applies his objects-individuation thesis to phenomena like crafts (technai), where the objects at issue seem to be subject matters. Medicine not only has health as its correlated object but is about health; health figures in the content of judgments that issue from the power of the craft. More g­ enerally, we never see Plato working to draw a distinction, or even recognizing the need to argue that there is or is not a distinction, between the domain of cognitive powers—what they are “over” or “set over,” in Republic V’s language—and the subject matters of their accomplishments, what they are about. There is more to say about the Content Overlap view, and I return to in my detailed discussions of doxa and epistêmê in Chapters 4 and 7, but here I will note that, despite my disagreements with it, I find it worth taking very seriously. It aims to respect all the evidence that cognitive kinds are distinguished by their objects, while also accommodating all the concerns that motivate typical Overlap readings: the alleged philosophical necessity of and textual evidence for epistêmê of perceptibles and doxa of Forms. I do think that it gets the most important point right: Plato’s thought is that one’s cognitive condition is determined by the objects with which one is in contact. I disagree only with the further claim that Plato wanted to distinguish what cognitive powers are over from what cognitions are about. If we reject any such distinction, then we are left with a stark Distinct Objects interpretation, and there remain worries about this. Why is epistêmê needed for ruling if there is no epistêmê of the perceptible realm; how can Plato deny doxa of Forms; and isn’t there textual evidence that he ac­know­ ledges overlap? I will address these worries in Chapters 4 and 7, arguing that Plato gives us resources to solve them, without embracing Content Overlap. I take the arguments of this chapter to show however that whether or not he was consistent in its application, Plato’s understanding of the relation

things (e.g. beauty), which are then applied in judgments about the same subject matter (e.g. beauty). Thus the activities of the powers have distinct objects, but the products of those ac­tiv­ ities—conceptions and judgments—do not. As I mentioned above, although there is plausibly a distinction to be drawn between cognitive exercise and cognitive product—the activity of cognizing produces a cognitive state—I see no signs that Plato was concerned to draw this distinction.

82 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology between cognitive kinds and their objects commits him to a Distinct Objects epistemology.

5.  Objects-Based epistemology Turning back now to the thesis that cognitive kinds are defined by their objects—the thesis central to the argument of this book—we find that the like-by-like view of cognition supports this too. There are two different types of object in the world; we are endowed with powers to cognize both; the powers, and also their exercises, resemble their allotted objects. Thus epistêmê exists, is distinct from other powers, and has the qualities it has, because its objects are the way they are; doxa exists, is distinct from other powers, and has the qualities it has, because its objects are the way they are. Each cognitive power and accomplishment is the way it is because the object is the way it is: Plato’s epistemology is objects-based. One important objection to consider, before we consider the consequences of this interpretation: there is a tradition going back to Aristotle that appears to interpret Plato’s views as proceeding in precisely the reverse order, from epistemology to metaphysics. Here is a passage we saw briefly in the last chapter: The theory [doxa] about the Forms48 occurred to those who state it on account of being persuaded of the truth of the Heraclitean theories that all perceptibles are always flowing, so that if there is going to be epistêmê of something, and phronêsis, there must be some other, abiding [menousas] natures beyond the perceptible ones. For epistêmê cannot be of the ­flowing.  (Metaphysics 1078b12–17)

The implication is that Plato began from various convictions about the nature of epistêmê, and the difference between it and doxa; given these views, he needed to come up with an ontology that would furnish these kinds with suitable objects, and this is what led him to posit the existence of Forms. This picture has real textual support: on a number of occasions Plato argues from the fact that we are able to achieve a good cognitive condition 48  Certainly a use of ‘doxa’ that would seem to go against the evidence for Distinct Objects in Aristotle (Chapter 1.3)! Aristotle is however here using ‘doxa’ the way later writers will use dogma; it is aptly translated ‘theory.’

Objects-Based epistemology  83 to the conclusion that there must be Forms. Most explicit is a passage from the Timaeus: If then nous and true doxa are two different kinds, then these things do by all means exist, themselves by themselves, the Forms that are im­per­cept­ ible to us and objects of nous only [nooumena]. If however, as it appears to some, true doxa and nous differ not at all, then whatever we perceive through the body must be assumed to be the most stable things there are. (Timaeus 51d)

When properly understood, however, such claims do not conflict with the objects-based reading of Plato’s epistemology. The key is to distinguish between Plato’s evidence for the intrinsic qualities of cognitive kinds, and his explanation for them. Plato clearly takes himself to have excellent reason to hold that there are two different cognitive kinds, one far superior to the other. (Recall Socrates’ claim we began with in the Introduction: that there is a difference between correct doxa and epistêmê is one of the few things he would claim to know (Meno 98b).) He also takes various features of epistêmê and doxa to be obvious and uncontroversial: for example, epistêmê is stable where doxa is not (an unargued assumption at Meno 98a), or epistêmê is infallible where doxa is not (an unargued assumption attributed to “anyone with any sense” at Republic 477e), or that epistêmê is clear, precise, always true, brings with it the ability to give a logos, and so on. He does not argue for these claims, nor does he say why they need no argument; we can conjecture that he thinks of them as conceptual truths, or empirically evident, or culturally accepted, but any rate he clearly thinks them obvious. This is not however to say that he takes these to be brute facts. Here is an alternate hypothesis: he holds (a) that epistêmê differs from doxa, in stability and clarity and all the other ways just listed, and (b) that cognitive kinds are defined by, individuated by, and resemble their objects (objects-based epis­ tem­ol­ogy). Therefore he holds that (c) there must be suitable objects to explain the nature and possibility of epistêmê. (He can already observe, through perception, that there are suitable objects to explain the nature and possibility of doxa). By way of analogy, imagine a zoologist examining a new terrain who finds both big rounded footprints and tiny pointed footprints. She recognizes (a*) that the two kinds of footprint differ, in size and in shape. She also has (b*) a (very reasonable!) animals-based theory of footprints on which footprints are defined by, individuated by, and resemble their makers.

84 Plato ’ s Objects-Based Epistemology (Footprints are, in essence, the prints left by the feet of animals; moreover footprints are like-by-like—big footprints are caused by big creatures, small ones by small creatures, and the shape of the footprint is inherited from the shape of the foot). Therefore she concludes that (c*) there must be big round-footed animals around, and also small pointy-footed ones. I am arguing that Plato proceeds the same way: whatever the order of his evidence, he takes the explanatory order to be metaphysics-first; his epistemology is objects-based. If we want to understand Plato’s epistemology, therefore, we now have a clear directive about how to proceed. First, we should abandon the assumption that Plato’s cognitive kinds map cleanly onto contemporary epis­tem­ol­ ogy’s knowledge and belief. These do not fit the objects-individuated model: unlike sight and hearing, knowledge and belief are object-neutral (I can have opinions about the same things you know or the same things I once knew). They do not fit the like-by-like model: one can stably know about changing things; one can have murky beliefs about clear things. Therefore they do not fit the objects-defined model: neither knowledge nor belief are nowadays characterized as, first and foremost, the kind of cognition one has of a particular type of object. Notice that this is not merely an issue about whether or not epistêmê and doxa are propositional attitudes. Indeed I think that that question, prominent as it has been in debates about Plato’s epis­ tem­ol­ogy, is largely orthogonal to the question of how epistêmê and doxa relate to contemporary philosophy’s knowledge and belief. Plato could perfectly well hold that epistêmê and doxa are propositional attitudes while still holding that they are objects-based: he could hold that in order for one to have epistêmê of the proposition that x is F, it must be the case that x is a certain kind of object or F a certain kind of property, and likewise for doxa. Thus even if epistêmê and doxa are propositional attitudes, their objects are essential to their nature, and this distinguishes them sharply from contemporary epistemology’s conceptions of knowledge and belief. Instead, we should go about understanding Plato’s epistemology by identifying the relevant objects of each cognitive kind, and showing how these objects explain the nature of the kinds. That is the project of the remainder of this book. Here is a brief preview of the results. Plato’s ontology—most fully in the Two Worlds dialogues, but to some extent throughout—is built around the idea that there is a fundamental distinction between two levels of reality, as illustrated most dramatically in the Republic’s Cave allegory. The best thing is Being, but there is also an inferior, derivative level, sometimes called Becoming, sometimes referred to in other

Objects-Based epistemology  85 ways. I will argue that Plato’s epistemology is built around that same ­div­ision. Just as on Plato’s view the world contains both colors and sounds, and we are equipped with special powers of grasping each, so too on Plato’s view the world contain both Being on the one hand, and something ­ontologically inferior on the other, and our souls are equipped with special powers of grasping each. Epistêmê is the power by which we understand Being: the ultimate real­ ities. When we exercise this power we have cognitions that are like Being: stable, precise, and clear. Epistêmê is thus best understood not as knowledge in the ordinary sense, but as a deep grasp of ultimate reality. Doxa meanwhile is the power by which we form impressions about the world’s inferior ontological kind: perceptible particulars that seem—are apparent to us, and invite us to believe in them—but fall short of Being. When we exercise this power on its objects we have cognitions that are like those objects in being unstable, imprecise, and unclear. Doxa is thus best understood not as belief or opinion in the ordinary sense, but rather as superficial thought that fails to penetrate beyond appearances.

3

Epistêmê Is of What Is If Plato’s epistemology is indeed objects-based, then he conceives of epistêmê first and foremost as the cognition of a certain kind of object. Epistêmê has the features it has, and differs from doxa in the ways that it does, and most generally is what it is, because it is the cognition of that kind of object. Identifying this defining object is therefore central to the project of understanding Plato’s epistêmê. This will explain why Plato attributes to epistêmê the particular features he does, such as the definitional requirement or the special relation to Forms; it will also be the key to understanding what kind of thing epistêmê itself is—whether it is knowledge, or understanding, or something else altogether. What then is this special object? What corresponds to epistêmê as color does to sight, the pleasant to appetite, or the beautiful to erôs?1 We find a very clear answer in our central text on the objects-based nature of epistêmê, namely Republic V’s powers argument. Epistêmê is set over what is (to on) (477a–b, 478a). Just as sight is the power to see the ­vis­ible, epistêmê is the power to have epistêmê of what is. To be sure, Plato sometimes suggests other answers: epistêmê is of the objects of gnôsis or noêsis, or is of what-can-be-learned (to gnôston, to ­noêton, to mathêma). As we saw in Chapter  2, however, these are merely ­formal characterizations of epistêmê’s object, not able to play the substantive ­def­in­ition­al role required in an objects-based epistemology. Moreover, as I will argue in Section 1, the context of the powers argument strongly suggests that it is identifying the defining object of epistêmê, and this suggestion is reinforced by other texts. Let us for now then take this as our working hypothesis: the defining object of epistêmê is what is.2 A worry might immediately arise that this is a very uninformative answer, one that advances our project of understanding epistêmê barely at

1  Charmides 167e–168d, discussed in Chapter 2.1. 2 At Parmenides 134a, epistêmê is of truth itself. I will argue that this is a sense of ‘truth’ which coincides very closely with the relevant sense of ‘being.’ Plato’s Epistemology: Being and Seeming. Jessica Moss, Oxford University Press (2021). © Jessica Moss. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198867401.003.0004

Epistêmê and What Is  87 all—at best, only by showing that that project depends on answering very vexed metaphysical and linguistic questions. For the meaning of ‘being’ throughout Plato’s texts, and in the Republic’s powers argument in particular, is famously ambiguous, and much contested. Some interpret the powers argument’s claim that epistêmê is “set over what is” as the claim that epistêmê is of what exists, others as the claim that epistêmê is of what is true, or of what is F for any predicate F, or of what is really F; some argue that Plato is appealing to some fusion of these senses.3 Surely only an overall in­ter­pret­ ation of the argument, or more broadly of Plato’s epistemology, can decide which of these is correct. Hence it may seem a hopeless interpretative task to begin with an account of being, and use that to construct an account of epistêmê. Furthermore, looking outside this one text, the problem becomes even worse. Very plausibly Plato’s notion of being changes and develops from text to text; trying to construct an epistemology based on that notion will give us a highly disunified account of epistêmê. In what follows I will argue that there is a general characterization of being which allays these worries. While it is not always clear how Plato is using ‘being,’ and while the world may in fact have different senses in different relevant contexts, the features of being relevant to its role as epistêmê’s defining object turn out to be reasonably simple, very general, and strongly unified across the dialogues. The key notion is of that which has superior ontological status, by contrast with things that have some derivative or in­fer­ ior status. This notion of ontological superiority—of what really is, by contrast with what is in some lesser way—is a notion Plato relies on in his metaphysics, and we can use it to explain his epistemology. The contrast between superior and inferior ontological levels plays out differently in different contexts: for example, as the contrast between essences and qualities, as the contrast between stable existence and unstable generation and destruction, or as the contrast between things themselves and their images. It is a job for the metaphysicians to analyze each of these contrasts and tell us how, if it all, they are unified—that is, whether Plato has a single theory of what makes things ontologically superior. There are also important questions as to whether Plato is committed to a substantive theory of what ontological superiority amounts to—for example, ­fundamentality—or whether his notion is largely undertheorized, waiting to be developed by Aristotle and others. I will make a few remarks about 3  See citations in Section 2.

88  Epistêmê Is of What Is these issues here (Section 4), but I hope to show that for our purposes, the general characterization of being as the ontologically superior turns out to be sufficient. For this general characterization yields an account of epistêmê which fits well with Plato’s texts, and explains all of epistêmê’s other features (Chapter 4). Identifying epistêmê’s defining object as being will thus yield an answer to our starting question: what is Plato’s basic conception of epistêmê? I consider the resulting picture in Chapter 5. We will find that Plato’s epistêmê is not fundamentally to be conceived of as knowledge, nor as Science, nor understanding, nor other familiar cognitive kinds. Fundamentally, it is to be conceived as a deep grasp of ultimate reality. In the book’s final chapter, after the discussion of doxa, I will turn to the question of why Plato would build his epistemology around such a concept.

1.  Epistêmê and what is The powers argument in Republic V gives us strong reason to take being as the defining object of epistêmê. First, as we saw in Chapter 2, Plato is here explicitly proposing a method for identifying powers by their objects, and so the fact that he here names being suggests that this is the most in­form­ ative characterization of epistêmê’s object. Second, Plato presents the claim that epistêmê is of being not just as true, but as obviously true—indeed, as something that everyone will accept. This second point emerges from the context. Socrates is taking as his imaginary interlocutor a “lover of sights,” an aesthete who considers himself an expert about beauty. The sight-lover’s views about epistêmê sharply oppose Socrates’ own: the sight-lover thinks that he has epistêmê, while Socrates will argue that only philosophers do; the sight-lover thinks that epistêmê comes from experience with perceptible things, while Socrates will argue that it instead requires a grasp of intelligible Forms. In arguing for his positions, however, Socrates wants to begin from premises that are ac­cept­ able to his opponent: the plan is to “soothe and persuade him gently, hiding from him that he is unhealthy [in mind]” (476e).4 Here are the premises he chooses: 4  Fine interprets this as “the dialectical requirement”: Socrates must argue from premises acceptable to his interlocutors (Fine 1990; cf. Fine 1978). Whether or not this is a generally promising interpretation of Socratic dialectic—and I suspect, given Socrates’ tendency to use

Epistêmê and What Is  89 Does the one who has gnôsis have it of something or nothing?5 . . . – He has gnôsis of something. – Something that is [on] or that is not? – Something that is. For how could what is not be the object of gnôsis [gnôstheiê]? – Are we then sufficiently assured of this, even if we examine it in many ways, that what completely is is completely an object of gnôsis [to men pantelôs on pantelôs gnôston], and what is in no way is in every way not an object of gnôsis? – Most sufficiently . . . – Gnôsis is over what is [epi men tôi onti] . . . Epistêmê is by nature over what is, to have gnôsis of what is as it is [gnônai hôs esti to on] (476e–477b)

Socrates is claiming that epistêmê is of or over what is, and he is claiming this almost without argument. He does give substantive arguments that epistêmê has a different object from doxa (477c–478a), and that doxa’s object is what is between being and not-being (478b–479d), recognizing both of these as controversial claims; that epistêmê is of what is, however, he presents as obvious. Indeed, he assumes that this claim will be readily accepted even by interlocutors who disagree with him radically about other features of epistêmê, and therefore can be used as a premise they accept in an argument that will undermine their view. The sight-lovers think that they themselves have epistêmê (476d); Socrates assumes that they must therefore think that the objects to which they attend, beautiful sights, are what is. If he can show them that beautiful sights are not in fact what is, as he purports to do with his arguments about the contradictory nature of perceptibles, they will thus have to abandon their claim to epistêmê.6 That epistêmê is of what is thus functions as a shared premise throughout the debate over who has epistêmê. Why is Socrates so confident that ‘epistêmê is of what is’ is both true and uncontroversial? It seems that he is taking this to be a generally accepted constraint on any account of epistêmê. Socrates can assume that all parties to a debate about epistêmê will agree to this claim, because anyone who words in ways that his interlocutors misunderstand, that it is not—it does seem that he is here going out of his way to emphasize that his first premises are ones his interlocutor will accept. 5  ὁ γιγνώσκων γιγνώσκει τὶ ἢ οὐδέν. As we have already observed, Socrates in this argument seems to use gnôsis interchangeably with epistêmê, and to use gignôskein as the verb correlate with both: note especially the wholly unflagged shift from talk of gnôsis to talk of epistêmê at 477a–b. 6  Indeed, while we never get an explicit statement of the sight-lovers’ ontology, we do get one for their representatives in the Cave allegory: cave-prisoners think that the shadows are what is (onta: 515b, following Slings).

90  Epistêmê Is of What Is denies it would have a very dubious claim to be talking about epistêmê at all. We might call this a basic principle about epistêmê: something assumed as not only true but beyond dispute. (If you think Plato is a believer in conceptual truths, you can say that he treats this as one of those. Alternately, you might think that he is treating it the way Aristotle treats the claims he takes as endoxa: commonly accepted views that should be respected by theory. I will stick with ‘principle’ as less theory-laden than either of these.) Notably, the claim that epistêmê is of what is shows up in another dialogue playing just this same role, as an unargued premise treated as beyond dispute, in an argument between opponents with sharply differing views of epistêmê. The dialogue is the Theaetetus.7 This makes the parallel particularly striking, for Socrates’ approach to epistêmê here differs sharply from his approach in the Republic. There he puts forth a radical epistemology of his own, on which epistêmê is the province only of philosophers, because it is of Forms rather than perceptibles; in the Theaetetus, he carefully considers the hypothesis that epistêmê is perception rather than rejecting it out of hand, and even after that hypothesis is refuted frequently uses as examples of epistêmê’s objects particular perceptible objects or facts.8 If we find Socrates in both contexts treating as indisputable that epistêmê is of what is, that is further evidence that Plato takes this claim to be included in any account of epistêmê—a basic principle. Therefore, while I will treat the Theaetetus’ epistemology in more detail in Chapter 10, I will give an initial discussion of this aspect of it here. The claim that epistêmê is of what is emerges in the first section of the dialogue. Theaetetus suggests that epistêmê is perception (aisthêsis); Socrates argues that he is thereby expressing Protagorean relativism, understood as the view that as things appear to each person, so they are

7  Cornford recognizes this similarity between the two arguments, and identifies a second, by equating the Theaetetus’ claim that epistêmê is without falsehood (apseudes) with the Republic’s claim that it is unerring (anamartêton). He takes both claims to name attributes that “any candidate for the title [of epistêmê] must possess on Plato’s views” (Cornford 1935, 29). Indeed it is widely recognized that the Theaetetus treats these two features of epistêmê as beyond dispute. See among others Burnyeat: “It has been agreed from the start (152c) that any candidate for knowledge must pass two tests: it must be always of what is and it must be unerring” (Burnyeat 1990, 8). 8  There is much to be said about the relation between the two dialogues, and in particular about the significance of the Theaetetus’ silence about Forms; here I want just to note that given these apparent differences, it is particularly noteworthy that both treat “epistêmê is of being” as a basic principle.

Epistêmê and What Is  91 for that person. What is the connection between the two views? Here is Socrates’ argument: [On Protagoras’ account], in matters of hot things and all things like that, as each person perceives things, so they are for that person . . . Perception therefore is always of what is, and without falsehood, as befits epistêmê.9 (152c, emphases added)

We can make sense of the argument as follows:10 (1) ASSUMPTION: Epistêmê is always of what is, and without falsehood. (2) Therefore if perception is epistêmê, perception must always be of what is and without falsehood. (3) Therefore if perception is epistêmê, my perceptions are true-and-ofwhat-is for me, your perceptions are true-and-of-what-is is for you—that is, Protagorean relativism holds. ASSUMPTION is never explicitly stated, let alone defended. Given the context—Socrates is drawing out the presuppositions or consequences of Theaetetus’ own account of epistêmê—he must be assuming not only that the claim is true, but also that Theaetetus accepts it. This is confirmed when the claim resurfaces in Socrates’ final refutation of Theaetetus’ account. The refutation begins with a difficult and muchdiscussed argument that perception does not grasp being (184b–186e).11 There is a good deal of contention in the secondary literature as to what Socrates here means by being (ousia); I will discuss the question briefly in Chapter  10. What is important for my purposes here however is neutral between all interpretations: whatever being is, Socrates assumes that epistêmê 9  αἴσθησις ἄρα τοῦ ὄντος ἀεί ἐστιν καὶ ἀψευδὲς ὡς ἐπιστήμη οὖσα. The hôs clause is confusing, since it looks like it treats the equation of perception with epistêmê as a premise in the argument rather than its conclusion; for an argument that it should be deleted, see White 1972. If we retain it, Levett’s translation, “as befits” works best. (Some translations limit the applicant of this clause to the second feature: “Perception, then, is always of something that is, and, as being knowledge, it is infallible” (Cornford; cf. McDowell), but it is widely recognized that the argument demands that we take both features as features perception must have if it is epistêmê (see quotations from Cornford’s commentary below). 10  For a different construal see Burnyeat (1982); our readings coincide on the point crucial to my discussion here, the uncontroversial status of what I call ASSUMPTION. 11  Perception cannot grasp or apprehend or hit on or lay hold of being: λαμβάνειν, 185b, τυχεῖν, 186c, ἅψασθαι, 186d, 186e). Plato seems to use these terms interchangeably; I will use ‘grasp’ to cover them all.

92  Epistêmê Is of What Is must grasp it. For having established that perception does not grasp being, he proceeds as follows: Perception has no share in grasping [hapsasthai] truth, since it has no [share in grasping] being [ousia], and therefore neither [has it any share in] epistêmê.12 And therefore perception is not the same as epistêmê. (186e)

Socrates is appealing again to ASSUMPTION, and again assuming that Theaetetus accepts it. That is, he is arguing: (4) Perception is not “of what is” (it does not grasp being).13 (5) Therefore it is also not “without falsehood” (it is not always true). (6) Therefore, by ASSUMPTION, perception is not epistêmê. Throughout the discussion, then, Socrates holds fixed this claim about epistêmê and assumes that even proponents of the radical theory accept it: whatever epistêmê is, it must be of what is. Thus just as in Republic V, the claim that epistêmê is of what is appears with the status of an unargued ­prin­ciple.14 (As does the claim that epistêmê is always true; I will discuss the relation of these claims below.) Thus we have seen that Plato presents the claim that epistêmê is of what is as undisputed common ground between Socrates of the Theaetetus, Socrates of the Republic, Theaetetus, and the Republic’s sight-lovers.15 Moreover, it is likely that he presents the claim this way not because he thinks there is something special uniting the views of these specific characters, but because he thinks the claim will be common ground between proponents of any theory of epistêmê. He treats it as a basic principle or perhaps even conceptual truth, as he does claims like “fear is of the terrible” or “sight is of color.” 12  οὐ μέτεστιν ἀληθείας ἅψασθαι: οὐδὲ γὰρ οὐσίας. . . οὐδ᾽ ἄρ᾽ ἐπιστήμης. 13  Is it significant that Socrates here uses ‘being’ (ousia), whereas at 152c he used ‘what is’ (to on)? I think not: in leading up to Premise (4) Socrates has used the noun ousia interchangeably with the verb einai (see especially 186b: “their being [οὐσία] and that they are [ὅτι ἐστὸν]….” Moreover, the present argument is clearly offered as a refutation of Theaetetus’ hypothesis; on the reading I have given, the argument is valid, while if ‘being’ in Premise (4) is distinct from ‘what is’ in Premise (1), it is not. 14  In Chapter 10 I will argue that it retains this status in the rest of the Theaetetus. 15  There is no reason to think that Theaetetus and the sight-lovers have the same views of epistêmê, although we learn too little about either to be sure. Certainly there is no reason to think the sight-lovers would accept the Protagorean relativism on which all perceptions are true and thus every perceiver is an epistêmôn (possessor of epistêmê), for they think themselves epistemically superior to others on the subject of beauty.

Which Sense Of ‘ being ’ ?  93 This is confirmed, as I will show below, by his unargued reliance on the claim in many other contexts too. If all this is right, then we should expect Plato to treat this as a fundamental feature of epistêmê, one he can rely on in developing his theories about epistêmê even when he does not explicitly appeal to it. More specifically, if Plato’s epistemology is objects-based, we should expect this to be the relevant object. Here then is a proposal: Plato takes the defining object of epistêmê to be being. We are faced now with two tasks: to make sense of the proposal by figuring out the relevant notion of being, and to test the proposal, seeing if it is borne out by Plato’s characterizations of epistêmê throughout the dialogues. I take on the first task in the remainder of this chapter. Once we see how Plato is using ‘being’ in the relevant contexts, I will show that we can indeed see this notion of epistêmê operative throughout the dialogues, making sense of his characterizations of epistêmê (Chapter 4).

2.  Which sense of ‘being’? If you are not steeped in scholarly controversies about Plato’s notion of being, you might think we have discovered something fairly simple, and furthermore something that strongly supports the view that epistêmê is knowledge more or less as we conceive it now. You might interpret the ‘what is’ in the phrase ‘epistêmê is of what is’ as meaning the facts, what is the case, and take the claim to be that epistêmê is veridical or factive. (Or you might even take it to mean what is true, i.e. true propositions, and reach the same result.)16 Thus you would take the claim we have identified as a basic prin­ ciple about epistêmê to amount to a claim nearly all philosophers now recognize as a basic principle about knowledge: knowledge is always true. If you are steeped in scholarly controversies about Plato’s notions of being, however, you will know that there are many, many competing ­in­ter­pret­ations. The secondary literature on the meaning of ‘being’ in our Republic and Theaetetus passages alone offers an embarrassment of options. Indeed, you may think that Plato’s notion of being is so ambiguous, so obscure, and so contested, that the project of using it as a starting-point for understanding anything else is deeply misguided.

16  Thus Fine 1978 and 1990, and Gosling 1968.

94  Epistêmê Is of What Is Much of the literature presents three options as exhaustive:17 when Plato says that epistêmê is of being, he intends either (i) an existential sense of ‘being,’ so that epistêmê would be of what exists (e.g. Stokes  1992, on the Republic), (ii) a veridical sense, so that epistêmê would be of true propositions (Fine 1990 on the Republic) or of actually obtaining states of affairs (Kahn 1981, 112–13), or (iii) a predicative sense, so that epistêmê would be of what is F, for any predicate F (among many others Annas 1981 on the Republic, and Burnyeat  1976 on the Theaetetus). There are however many more interpretations out there. Perhaps Plato intends (iv) a special genuinepredicate sense, so that epistêmê would be of what is genuinely or really F, by contrast with imitations (Vlastos 1981 on the Republic). Or (v) an essential sense, so that epistêmê would be of the essence of Fness (Silverman 2002). Or (vi) a specially Platonic metaphysical sense, so that epistêmê would be of the Forms (Cornford 1935 on the Theaetetus). Or (vii) an objective sense, so that epistêmê would be of what is objectively the case rather than what merely appears so (Cooper 1970 on the Theaetetus). Or (viii) some “fused” sense which incorporates two or more of these (Bosanquet 1895, Kahn 1981, Brown 1994).18 This is an important and difficult controversy about which an enormous amount has been written. If we have to settle it for each dialogue in order to understand epistêmê, we have a truly daunting task ahead of us. Indeed, we might be strongly inclined to follow Vlastos in suggesting the opposite course: in the Republic at least, we should take Plato’s theory of being to derive from his notion of epistêmê: what it is to be is to be well-suited to be the object of epistêmê, where Plato is starting from an independently fixed conception of epistêmê.19

17  For the three-item menu see among others Fine 1990, Annas 1981 at 196, Taylor 2008, Lee 2010. 18  Kahn argues that many of Plato’s uses of ‘being’ are “overdetermined,” requiring that we read more than one sense: for example, in Plato’s characterization of Forms at Phaedo 65d, “Veridical idea, existence claim, and predicative syntax are all taken up” in the word ousia (1981, 109); cf. Brown (1994). 19  On Vlastos’ view, Plato’s notion of being in the powers, Line, and Cave arguments in the Republic amounts to reality, and the real is “that which is cognitively dependable, undeceiving” (1981, 7). More specifically, Plato starts with a notion of epistêmê as a priori “logical certainty” (ibid., 17), and assigns being to things to the degree that they admit of that kind of knowledge. On this view, the Form of Beauty is such that we can know logical truths about it, and that is what Plato means in giving it a superior ontological status; beautiful perceptibles are not susceptible to such knowledge, and that is what Plato means in giving them an inferior onto­ logic­al status.

Which Sense Of ‘ being ’ ?  95 I want to show that the problem is at once harder and easier than it seems. On the one hand, when correlating epistêmê with being Plato uses ‘being’ in such a variety of formulations that the task of finding a unified syntactic account looks almost hopeless (see the formulations mentioned in Contrasts 1–4 below). On the other hand—and crucially for my project— we do not in fact need to determine the sense of ‘being’ in each passage in order to fix on the epistemically relevant feature of Plato’s notion of being. Our account will be compatible with many different interpretations of ‘being,’ as well as with the possibility that the word has different meanings in different contexts, or that Plato’s usage is simply indeterminate. To understand the basic concept of epistêmê as cognition of being, we need only insist on one feature of Plato’s notion of being, one which is compatible with a whole range of other details. Here is my proposal. When Plato labels certain objects (e.g. the Forms) as being, or says that they are, and goes on to say that they are the objects of epistêmê, ‘being’ (or ‘to be’) has one constant function. This is the function of assigning its referents a privileged status among all the things that exist. Plato is saying or implying that these things most are, or perhaps really are.20 He is marking them as ontologically superior to other things, things which do exist but lack this special status: things that are in a derivative sense, or dependently, or to a lesser degree—the ontologically inferior. The notion of ontological superiority is, I submit, one that Plato takes for granted without explicitly theorizing. I say a bit about how to understand it in Section 4. As to the meaning of ‘being’ in these various contexts, I leave open two possibilities, on the grounds that I cannot see a way to decide between them, and suspect that Plato did not determinately distinguish them. First, perhaps ‘being’ has one of the meanings generally recognized—and perhaps even different meanings in different contexts. (For example, perhaps it has predicative-cum-existential import in Republic V’s powers arguments, while at Euthyphro 11a (quoted in Chapter  9) it instead means essence.) But in these contexts, Plato uses ‘being’ to express not just one of these familiar senses, but a stronger claim, best captured by adding a ‘really’: he is saying not simply for example that the Form is beautiful (the predicative reading), or exists (the existential reading), but that it really is beautiful, really exists, and so on—where this ‘really’ entails that it is ontologically superior. 20  This is not to be confused with what I have called the genuine sense, on which “the Form of Beauty is” means that the Form of Beauty is genuinely beautiful, by contrast with particulars which are sham imitations (Vlastos 1981; cf. Moline 1981).

96  Epistêmê Is of What Is Second, perhaps in at least some of these contexts ‘being’ simply means ontological superiority: we should translate simply “the Form Is,” full stop. In either case, the claim Plato takes as a basic principle is that epistêmê is of the ontologically superior.21 Let us mark this use of ‘being’ and variants with capitalization: Plato is saying that epistêmê is of Being, what Is.

3.  Being as the ontologically superior22 It is not my purpose here to defend a detailed interpretation of Plato’s metaphysics, neither across the corpus nor in any one dialogue. I want instead to use a bird’s-eye overview to point out a general pattern throughout the Two Worlds dialogues (and indeed, I will argue in Chapters 9 and 10, in the earl­ ier and later dialogues as well). The pattern I have in mind should be fairly obvious, and its existence fairly uncontroversial. It is this: throughout the dialogues, and in a wide variety of contexts, Plato draws contrasts between superior and inferior items, and uses variants on ‘being’ to label the su­per­ior items. Moreover, wherever he does this, he correlates Being with epistêmê, and the inferior items with doxa. In other words, Plato’s works show ­variations on the following argument: • Some things are special, and superior to the rest, in virtue of having some feature x: for example stability and permanence, or genuineness, or being an essence. (Plato gives different values for x in different contexts.) • The x-having things are beings or what is (or some similar formula); the x-lacking things have some lower ontological status. • The x-having things are the objects of epistêmê, the x-lacking things the objects of doxa. The pattern is particularly explicit in the Two Worlds dialogues’ contrast between Forms and perceptibles. Here Plato uses ousia and einai in a var­iety of formulations to characterize Forms. The Form of something is a being (ousia, Phaedo 77a), or the being itself (autê hê ousia, Phaedo 78d), or what is (ho esti, Republic 507b), or that itself which each thing is (auto to ho 21  This raises the question of whether Socrates is fair after all in taking interlocutors like the sight-lovers or Theaetetus to agree with the claim that epistêmê is of what is, i.e. in taking his characterization of epistêmê to capture an uncontroversial, widely shared view; I address this question below, in Section 7. 22  My discussion of the connection between epistêmê and being in this section and the next has some important similarities to Szaif 1996.

Being As The Ontologically Superior  97 estin,23 Phaedo 78d; cf. 75b, 75d), or that which good or just is (Phaedo 75d), or what a bed is (Republic 597a). Or Forms are in a superlative way: the Form is what really is (ontôs esti, Republic 597d, Phaedrus 247c, Sophist 248a) or what fully or utterly or purely is (pantelôs on, elikrinôs on, Republic 477a; teleôs on, Republic 597a), or what is in nature (en têi phusei ousa, Republic 597b), or what is as much as can be (einai hôs hoion te malista, Phaedo 77a). As for perceptibles, while Plato often casually refers to them as things that are,24 he also often explicitly contrasts them with Forms by denying them that label and assigning them instead some other status. That is, he not only says that the Forms are in some special way, but in so doing contrasts them with ordinary things, in a variety of ways. Looking at these contrasts will give us more information about what makes Forms count as Beings: (Contrast 1) What fully or purely is versus what is between being and notbeing (Republic 479c–e)25 (Contrast 2) Being versus becoming (genesis) (Timaeus 27d–28a, Republic 534a, Sophist 248a, Philebus 59a)26 (Contrast 3) What is F (or what the F is) versus “the many F things” (Phaedo 74d–76d, Republic 507b (Contrast 4) What is versus its likenesses or images (Phaedrus 250a–250b, Republic 597a)27 23  For discussion of this difficult phrase see Gallop’s notes ad loc (1975, 229–30). 24  Consider for example the contrast at Republic 507b between “the many beautifuls and many goods . . . which we say are [εἶναί  φαμέν]” and “the beautiful itself and the good itself . . . which we label what each thing is [ὃ  ἔστιν  ἕκαστον προσαγορεύομεν];” cf. Phaedrus 249c, where “the things we now say are [ἃ νῦν εἶναί φαμεν]” are contrasted with “that which really is [τὸ ὂν ὄντως]”. 25  The argument begins with a distinction between what fully (παντελῶς) is and what is between purely being and in no way being (477a), and ends by identifying the Forms as the former, perceptibles as the latter (479c–e). 26  “With the body we share in becoming, but through reasoning and with the soul we relate to what really is [τὴν ὄντως οὐσίαν]” (Sophist 248a). Timaeus 27d–28a contrasts “what is always being and has no becoming” with “what is always becoming and never is….becoming and getting destroyed, but never really being [τὸ γιγνόμενον μὲν ἀεί . . . ὄντως δὲ οὐδέποτε ὄν]. Philebus 59a contrasts “things that always are” with “things that become and will become and have become.” Throughout Republic VII Plato refers to the perceptible realm symbolized by the cave as Becoming, and the intelligible realm of Forms as Being: see for example 518c and 534a. 27  A beautiful perceptible thing is a likeness (ὁμοίωμα) or image (εἰκών) of the Being (viz., the Form) (Phaedrus 250a–250b); the carpenter “does not make the Form, which we say is what Is a bed [ὃ ἐστι κλίνη]…if he does not make what Is, he does not make something that Is, but something such as to be like something that Is, but is not [εἰ μὴ ὃ ἐστιν ποιεῖ, οὐκ ἂν τὸ ὂν ποιοῖ, ἀλλά τι τοιοῦτον οἷον τὸ ὄν, ὂν δὲ οὔ]. For if someone said that the carpenter’s bed is something that completely [τελέως] Is . . . they would not be speaking truly” (Republic 597a).

98  Epistêmê Is of What Is These contrasts look to be different from one another, and they pull us toward different explanations of the superiority of the Forms. Indeed, it is no surprise that students of Plato’s metaphysics have come up with quite different interpretations of the nature of the Forms. I will say something about what ‘being’ might mean in these different contexts; then I will argue that we need not in fact settle the question of its meaning in order to see the crucial thing these contrasts have in common. Contrast 1 is argued for on the basis of the claim that each of the many F things will also have, or appear to have, the opposite quality not-F, while the Form is always the same as itself (Republic 479a–b; for similar contrasts see Phaedo 78d–e, Symposium 211a). It seems that here feature x—the feature in virtue of which Forms alone are entitled to be called beings—is purity, by contrast with admixture of opposites. If we confined our attention to passages like this, we would be inclined to say that ‘The Forms are’ simply means that the Forms are pure instances of the corresponding qualities— hence the popularity of the predicative interpretation of ‘being.’ Contrast 2 is slightly different: perceptibles are what merely become rather than what is because they change; evidently feature x here is stability. One could of course try to reconcile these two contrasts by making the first basic: to be is to be pure; stability is necessary for purity because change brings admixture of opposites. But the label ‘becoming’ very notably emphasizes change as the mark of the ontologically inferior, rather than impurity. If we confined our attention to the passages drawing Contrast 2 alone, we would be inclined to say that ‘The Forms are’ means that the Forms are stable, eternal, unchanging: to use Kahn’s phrase, the verb ‘to be’ here seems to have “static value” (1981, 111). Contrast 3 is often drawn on the basis of Contrast 1: in the very contexts where Plato distinguishes between the Form which is always F and the many Fs which are in some way not-F, he refers to the first as “the what is F,” “the what the F is,” “the F itself,” or even “the nature of the F itself.”28 Yet this way of putting it seems to make a claim not about purity (as in Contrast 1) but instead about something else: the implication is that the Form is the essence of F-ness, or is identical with the property F-ness, or has that property in some primary, essential way, while the many Fs merely share in it

28  For this last see Republic 476b: lovers of sights and sounds love the beautiful sounds and colors and shapes and all the things fashioned out of such things, but their thought is unable to see and love the nature of the beautiful itself (αὐτοῦ δὲ τοῦ καλοῦ . . . τὴν φύσιν). For the other formulations see among others Republic 507b, Phaedo 76b.

Being As The Ontologically Superior  99 derivatively. Here feature x is being an essence, and it is tempting—albeit semantically awkward—to translate ‘being’ in these various formulations as ‘essence.’ Contrast 4 looks to make a different point altogether. Here feature x is originality or genuineness: being the real thing by contrast with a copy. Coupled with the pervasiveness of model-copy imagery in Plato’s depiction of Forms even where he does not explicitly contrast what is with what appears—in the Cave allegory, for example—these passages incline us toward a reading on which ‘The Forms are’ means that the Forms are the genuine articles. Thus Plato seems to make quite disparate claims in different contexts about the nature of Forms and their superiority to perceptibles, and therefore to imply quite different meanings for ‘being. This leaves students of Plato’s metaphysics with the task of trying to reconcile these various meanings by singling out one as basic. (For example, if ‘being’ ultimately means being an essence, then Forms’ purity, stability, and role as paradigms all follow from their being essences.29 Or if ‘being’ ultimately means being genuine (by contrast with copies), all the rest follows from this: paradigms are more stable, more pure, and better guides to the essence than their copies.)30 That is not my task, nor do I wish to take a stance on whether or not it is a feasible one—on whether Plato does in fact have a single unifying view about Forms, or instead has a plurality of independent views. I want simply to point out that in all these contexts, despite the questions about its meaning, the label ‘being’ plays the same role: it serves to mark out one class of things as superior to the rest. ‘Being’ does not always have this function: sometimes Plato uses it simply to say that something exists, or has some property, or is the case, without further implication. In Contrasts 1–4, however, it is used to contrast its referents with other things, and to elevate them above the rest. When Plato puts the claim that some things are more pure, or stable, or original, than others by saying that these things alone are, he is ascribing these things a privileged status in the order of reality. One promising although vague way to put it: he is saying that these are somehow what really is. Before we consider what this might mean (Section 4), let me say a bit more about how I take the implication to work.

29  For a version of this approach see Silverman 2002, 19–20: Being is a primitive relation between a thing and its essence; the other ways that things are (such as identity, and existence) flow from this. 30  Moline 1981.

100  Epistêmê Is of What Is As we saw above, sometimes Plato makes the privileging explicit by qualifying ‘being’ with some intensifier like ‘fully’ (pantelôs, Republic 477a), ‘purely’ (eilikrinôs) (Republic 477a), ‘completely’ (teleôs, Republic 597a), or, most often, with its own adverbial form, ‘beingly’ (ontôs, Timaeus 28a, Phaedrus 247c–e, 249c, Sophist 248a, Republic 597d, among many others). This last is often translated as “really,” and this is apt so long as we understand ‘really’ in the special metaphysical way I will detail below, on which it denotes ontological superiority. For example: Is there something that is always being and has no becoming, and something that is always becoming and never is . . . . becoming and getting destroyed, but never really Being [ontôs . . . on]? (Timaeus 27d–28a)

Here Plato moves from a simple statement of Contrast 2—Forms are stable while perceptibles change—to the claim that the Form alone really is. My proposal is that even where there is no such explicit move, we should understand an implicit ‘really’ wherever we see ‘being’ as a contrast term. For example, in Contrast 3, we should understand a contrast between the many Fs and what really is F, or what the F really is. Questions will remain about the sense of ‘being’ at issue in these different contexts and—to repeat—I am not trying to settle them. I am instead saying that whatever ‘being’ means in these contexts, it is amplified by an implicit really.31 For example, in the powers argument of Republic V, when Plato moves from claiming (1) that every one of the many beautiful things is sometimes ugly (479a–b), to claiming (2) that the many beautifuls are “between being and not-being” (479c–e), there are two possibilities. First, perhaps ‘being’ in claim (2) has one of the senses others have proposed, but intensified by an implicit really. Perhaps for example it has predicative sense, but the claim is that the perceptibles are “between being really beautiful and not being beautiful.” Plato is thus not simply repeating claim (1), but taking it to entail that the perceptibles are not really beautiful. Or perhaps being in claim (2) has 31  I am as throughout bracketing Fine’s propositional reading, since I think Forms rather than propositions are at issue in all these contexts. There is in fact an easy way to extend the view to the propositional reading (although it is not at all what Fine has in mind): true propositions exclusively concerning Forms are really true; propositions involving perceptibles are at best derivatively or loosely true. Indeed I think Plato would accept just this claim: see my discussion of truth in Chapter 4.1 and Chapter 7.6.

What Is Ontological Superiority?  101 existential sense, but again we must supply a really. Plato is thus not making the bizarre claim that perceptibles only partially exist, but instead the paradigmatically metaphysical claim (more on this in a moment) that they are not what really exists. Likewise for other proposed interpretations: we can accept one of the extant interpretations, but add a really. Second, perhaps ‘being’ in claim (2) simply means ontological superiority: the claim is that perceptibles are not what really is, full stop—that is, the claim is that they are ontologically inferior. (Note that on either of these proposals there will remain a mystery about how this argument at Republic V works. On any of the accounts I am offering, Plato owes us an argument connecting claim (1), about the impurity or instability of the many beautifuls, to claim (2), about their ontological ­in­fer­ior­ity. Why must the ontologically superior Beings be pure? That is a ­question about Plato’s metaphysics that I will not undertake to answer here, although I suspect that it is in part a matter of metaphysical prejudice in­herit­ed from Parmenides, and perhaps in part due to an epistemologicallydriven argument implicit in one attributed to him by Aristotle:32 given that epistêmê is stable, that cognition is of like-by-like, and that epistêmê is of Being, Being must be stable, and hence pure.)

4.  What is ontological superiority? But what does it mean for something really to be—to be ontologically su­per­ior? One might protest that this notion is empty until we decide what ‘being’ means. Is the idea that the ontologically superior exists more than the ontologically inferior? That it is more F for some salient predicate? That it is more stable, more genuine, more of an essence? In fact, however, the notion of ontological superiority is intelligible in its own right—or at the least, it is the sort of thing that Plato might have taken to be intelligible in its own right, and indeed as not needing explanation. Certainly it is an idea we find in his student. Aristotle argues that while “being [to on] is said in many ways,” one kind of thing “is first” (prôton on); note that like Plato he reserves ‘Being’ (ousia) in a strict sense for this kind

32 See Metaphysics 1078b12–17, quoted at the end of Chapter 2.

102  Epistêmê Is of What Is of thing (Metaphysics1028a10–15).33 (I say more about Aristotle’s notion of primary being below). It is an idea that survives in modern metaphysics too; indeed, it is arguably a basic metaphysical notion. Thus for example K.  Fine: “[T]here is a primitive metaphysical concept of reality, one that cannot be understood in fundamentally different terms” (2001, 1).34 Is there anything more we can say, to give the notion substance? I hesitate to attribute to Plato any very developed view: I see him as working with an under-theorized notion which he takes to a large extent for granted. Moreover, we might agree with Fine that the notion is primitive, not ex­plic­ able in other terms. Nonetheless, Plato may well at least sometimes have in mind a view that Aristotle attributes to him, and himself endorses in his theory of primary being: the real is the fundamental—that on which other things depend. As Aristotle puts it, “If the primary beings were not, it would be impossible for anything else to be” (Categories 2b5–6). There is plenty of debate about how to understand this notion, some of it echoing the dispute about Plato: is being in this context existence? Essence?35 There is also a question about whether Aristotle thinks that these dependence relations actually constitute what it is to be a primary being, or are merely entailed by primacy. Without settling these questions, however, we can recognize the crucial point that Aristotle clearly had a notion he expressed in terms of ontological superiority (primacy) on which the ontologically superior items are those on which others depend. Moreover he thinks he finds exactly this notion in Plato: Some things are said to be prior . . . in nature and being [protera . . . kata phusin kai ousian], as many as admit of being without other things, while those do not admit of being without them; Plato made use of this distinction. (Metaphysics 1019a1–4)

33 Cf. Metaphysics 1019a4–6. Translations often give “substance” for Aristotle’s ousia, but it is the same term we have seen translated in Plato as “being”—the verbal noun from εἶναι, “to be.” 34  Or: “When I was introduced to metaphysics as an undergraduate, I was given the following definition: metaphysics is the study of ultimate reality. This still seems to me the best def­in­ ition of metaphysics I have seen” (van Inwagen  2015, 1, 4). For more on Fine’s and van Inwagen’s views see below. For some discussion of the history of the view that metaphysics is about reality, and defense of a version on which the notion of reality is specified as existence, see McDaniel 2017. 35  See for example Peramatzis 2011, defending an essential reading: for one thing to be prior for another is for the first to be what it is independently of the other but not vice versa.

What Is Ontological Superiority?  103 There is no consensus that any of Plato’s writings testify to precisely this claim, nor even about what aspect of Plato’s theory Aristotle here has in mind. It is however widely recognized that Plato construes perceptibles as depending on the Forms, which are by contrast independent of perceptibles: consider most explicitly the Phaedo’s argument that Forms are the causes, aitiai, of their participants’ properties (Phaedo 100c), or the pervasive idea represented in our Contrast 4 that Forms are the models of which their participants are copies. Plausibly Plato, just like Aristotle, took this to be part of the idea of ontological superiority: for the Beings to be real is in part a matter of, or entails, them being the foundations of all else. (Note that on this view the Form of the Good, on which other Forms depend for their Being (Republic 509b), will be the most real thing, the supreme Being, while the other Forms will be ontologically inferior to it. This is certainly one way to make sense of the notoriously difficult claim that the Good is the source of other things’ Being, and is itself “beyond being” (epekeina, 509b).36) If this is Plato’s conception of ontological superiority, we can see him as inheriting it from the Presocratics. In the Sophist, he refers to Presocratic attempts to “define the things that are [ta onta], how many and of what sort they are” (Sophist 242c).37 He goes on to say that we need to investigate the notion of being, opening up important questions about its nature, but as these lines show, the Sophist’s whole discussion presupposes a general notion of being that Plato takes Parmenides and others to share. The Presocratics were disputing over the nature and number of the primary or fundamental or most real things, what Aristotle in discussing their theories will often refer to as the archai, foundations or starting-points or first prin­ciples (Metaphysics 983b19), and sometimes as ousia, Being (Metaphysics 1028b3–6). Indeed, this looks to be a basic metaphysical notion, from the pre-Socratics’ time 36  Thus Adam (1902, ad loc.): “As the cause of γένεσις, we may, in fact, regard the Sun as the only true γένεσις, for all γιγνόμενα are derived from him. Similarly, the Good is not οὐσία in the sense in which the Ideas are  οὐσίαι; but in a higher sense it is the only true  οὐσία, for all οὐσίαι are only specific determinations of the Good.” 37  τὰ ὄντα διορίσασθαι πόσα τε καὶ ποῖά ἐστιν. He goes on to speak of some who report that there are three beings (242c), or two or one (242d; the last are the Eleatics), or both one and many (242e). Cornford translates τὸ ὄν in this part of the Sophist as “the real” or “reality,” saying “This sense of the word has emerged from the contrast between the sort of existence belonging to an eidolon [image, copy], and the real existence of the ὄντως ὄν” (1935, 216 note 1, comment ad 242b–244b). Ι think this is on the right track, but too narrow: even if Plato himself sometimes wants to analyze what Is as what is real by contrast with images, he is unlikely to be attributing this view to Parmenides and the other pre-Socratics. Instead, he is pointing to a more general notion he shares with them: that of the ontologically superior.

104  Epistêmê Is of What Is down to ours, appearing variously in the guise of archai, substances, or fundamental realities, undergirding theories of degrees of reality and of grounding. Certain things are more real than others, and the less real things are somehow dependent on or derivative of the more real. I suggest then that in the Two Worlds dialogues Plato is working with an inchoate theory of ontological superiority as fundamentality: the things that really are, the Beings, are the grounds of the other things that exist. I do not however propose that this is definitively what ontological superiority amounts to, for Plato—that is, I do not propose that we read this notion into every contrast he draws between Being and something inferior. Rather, this is one way he began to develop a more general, more neutral, and perhaps even primitive notion of the real. Perhaps when he appeals to ontological superiority in the Socratic dialogues or in the Theaetetus (as I will argue that he does, in Chapters 9 and 10), he does not have fundamentality in mind at all. Perhaps he does not always have it in mind even when privileging the Forms as Beings. There is another widespread way to flesh out the notion of ontological superiority: the idea is that what is real is contrasted with what seems, or appears. Some take this to be the core contrast that defines the notion of the real.38 I think this too specific to capture the general notion we find in Plato. For him, it will turn out to be one of several ways of developing the contrast between what Is and something inferior, alongside the ones we have seen above: I discuss it as Contrast 5, in Chapter 6. It will be a very important contrast, and absolutely central to his epistemology, for—I will argue—it is the contrast that underlies his notion of doxa. Nonetheless, I see no reason to think that this is what Being means for Plato, nor that every time Plato contrasts what Is with something inferior, this is what he has in mind. The contrast with what seems captures an epistemologically salient aspect of Plato’s notion of the real; it does not exhaust that notion. Indeed, the safest characterization of reality, or ontological superiority, is a very neutral one: just as in calling some things good one privileges them above others on the scale of value, so in calling some things Beings one privileges them above others on the scale of being. Uninformative though this characterization may be, it is not empty. The idea that some things are 38  For example, K. Fine claims that the “metaphysical conception of reality” serves to “distinguish, within the sphere of what is the case, between what is really the case and what is only apparently the case” (2001, 3); van Inwagen fleshes out the claim that metaphysics is about ultimate reality as: “Metaphysics, then, attempts to get behind appearances and to tell the ul­tim­ate truth about things” (2015, 4).

Epistêmê and the Ontologically Superior  105 evaluatively superior to others is a substantive one—some will deny it; thus even if you do not have a developed theory of value, you are still making a substantive move in privileging some things above others as the good ones. Likewise, the idea that some things are ontologically superior to others is a substantive one; many will deny it, or even reject it as incoherent. Thus even if you do not have a developed theory of being, you are still making a substantive move in privileging some things above others as the Beings.

5.  Epistêmê and the ontologically superior Now to the crucial point for our understanding of Plato’s epistemology: throughout the Two Worlds dialogues (and outside of them too, as I will argue in Chapters 9 and 10), wherever Plato draws contrasts between Being and the ontologically inferior he correlates epistêmê with Being, and doxa with its ontologically inferior counterpart. We have already seen this in the case of Contrast 1 (the Forms fully are, while perceptibles are between being and not-being). This contrast is drawn in the context of Republic V’s powers argument: Plato introduces “what fully is” as epistêmê’s object and “what is between being and not-being” as doxa’s (477a–b, 478d); philosophers, the ones with epistêmê, attend to what purely Is; those who confine themselves to what is between being and not-being are philodoxoi, lovers of doxa (479d–480a). When Plato draws Contrast 2—the Forms are, while perceptibles merely become—epistêmê is again correlated with Being, while doxa is of the in­fer­ ior class, becoming. For example, in a passage we have seen already from the Timaeus: Is there something that is always Being, but has no becoming, and something that is always becoming, but never Being? The former is grasped by noêsis with reason [logos], always being in the same ways, the latter in turn is the object of [doxaston] through doxa with unreasoned perception, becoming and passing away, but never really Being [ontôs de oudepote on]. (Timaeus 27d–28a)

We see the same correlation throughout the Sun, Line and Cave images in the Republic. In the Sun analogy, when the soul attends to what Is (to on), it has gnôsis and nous, while when it attends to what becomes and passes away

106  Epistêmê Is of What Is (to gignomenon kai apollumenon), it has doxa instead (508d). In the Cave allegory, the educational process that takes a student from doxa to epistêmê “turns the soul away from becoming toward what Is” (521d). When Socrates summarizes the entire discussion of the Line and Cave, he makes it most explicit: Doxa is about [peri] becoming, while noêsis is about Being.  (Republic 534a)39

In the Philebus, those arts which study things that come to be must use doxa (59a); epistêmê and nous “possessed of the highest truth” are of “what is really and is always the same” (to on kai to ontôs kai to kata tauton aei) (Philebus 58a; cf. 59c–d).40 When Plato draws Contrast 3—Forms are what each F Is, by contrast with the many F things—again the Beings are the objects of epistêmê. We see this in the Republic’s contrast between sight-lovers and philosophers: those who contemplate Beauty itself have epistêmê, while those who attend to the many beautifuls have only doxa (479d–e). In the Phaedo, the philosopher attains the goal of wisdom when his soul makes contact with “what Is [tou ontos]” and “the Being that each thing really Is” (tês ousias ho tunchanei hekaston on) (65c–e).41 When he draws Contrast 4—Forms are what Is, while perceptibles are likenesses or images of them—once again it is the Beings that are objects of epistêmê. In the Phaedo and Phaedrus, it is only through direct, disembodied apprehension of the Forms, rather than their perceptible likenesses, that we can have epistêmê (Phaedo 65a–66a; Phaedrus 247c–248b).42 39  Noêsis has just been said to include both dianoia and epistêmê (533e–534a). 40  See Chapter 2.3 for a discussion of the Philebus’ treatment of the doxa-using crafts as lowly forms of epistêmê. For our purposes here, the crucial point is that there is a correlation between ontological and epistemic superiority: the highest or truest epistêmê is of what really Is. 41  “It is through reasoning that anything of the things that are [τι τῶν ὄντων] become clear to it. And [the soul] reasons most finely when [undisturbed by the body] . . . it reaches out for what Is,” because never with the body can one touch the Just itself, the Beautiful, “or in a word what the Being of anything is.. [and the one who ignores the body] because whenever it is in communion with the soul it disturbs the soul and doesn’t allow it to obtain truth and phronêsis, isn’t this the one . . . who hits on what Is?” (Phaedo 65c–66a). 42  Fine  2016 argues that the Phaedo countenances epistêmê of perceptibles, in two ways. First, the argument of 65c–66a (quoted in the preceding note) identifies the cognition of Forms as phronêsis, leaving it open that epistêmê may be of perceptibles. To this I reply that the argument concerns the best epistemic condition, the one possessed by philosophers, which Plato calls by various names, but which he consistently restricts to Being (see Chapter 1.2). Second, she argues that, just as on her reading of the Republic, Plato shows not that the highest kind of

Epistêmê is of what is, revisited  107 Throughout the Two Worlds dialogues, then, epistêmê is correlated with the ontologically superior. In Chapters 9 and 10 I will argue that we also see a version of this pattern in the earlier dialogues, and in the later dialogue which gave us evidence above for the truistic status of the claim that epistêmê is of being, the Theaetetus. Even without the full-blown distinction between Forms and perceptibles, Plato consistently privileges certain items with the label ‘being,’ and makes these the province of epistêmê by contrast with doxa. At any rate, for now we have seen enough to conclude that when the Republic’s powers argument casts epistêmê’s defining object as “what is,” Plato has in mind Being—the ontologically superior.

6.  Epistêmê is of what is, revisited I have argued that despite important differences in Plato’s metaphysical claims in different contexts, and significant questions about how to interpret his various uses of ‘being,’ we can identify a consistent, unified, general account of the epistemically relevant notion of being. The defining object of epistêmê is the ontologically superior: ultimate reality. When Plato identifies being as the object of epistêmê, he is operating with a hierarchical ontology in which some items get dignified with the term ‘being,’ and others denigrated with a contrast term. Epistêmê is of the ontologically superior. I am not saying that the differences in the varying features he identifies as conferring Being are unimportant for our purposes. They will matter quite a bit to the details of Plato’s account of epistêmê, as we will see in the next chapter. For example, where essence is the crucial feature x that makes something a Being, epistêmê will amount to a grasp of essences, entailing the ability to give definitions. A full, comprehensive account of Plato’s epistêmê would thus have to take on the metaphysical questions that I have bracketed here. Does Plato have a single account of Being that unifies the various contrasts we have seen by making one primary (for example, to Be is to be an essence, and all the other features flow from this)? If so, he will also have a unified account of epistêmê across the dialogues (for example, it cognition is only of Forms, but that it requires cognition of Forms. I see no sign that Plato is trying to leave open this possibility, however, and I suspect Fine’s argument is motivated by the wish to avoid the alleged pitfalls of a Distinct Objects interpretation. If my arguments in Chapters 1 and 2 are successful, they undermine that motivation.

108  Epistêmê Is of What Is is first and foremost to be understood as the cognition of essences, and all its other features flow from this.) Or does he have a hodge-podge of independent views about what makes something a Being, in which case the details of his account of epistêmê will differ from context to context—sometimes it is a grasp of essence, sometimes of stable entities, sometimes of genuine entities, with the different features those differences in object will entail? I will not offer any answer to these questions, not because I think they are unimportant, but because they are downstream from the project I am undertaking in this book. That is the project of identifying Plato’s basic epistemological concepts and aims. I hope in this chapter to have made progress on that project by identifying the defining object of epistêmê, at a suitably general level: Being, i.e., the ontologically superior. A final note: if Plato’s claim that epistêmê is of what is turns out to mean that epistêmê is of the ontologically superior, then does this claim really deserve the status of unargued premise that he gives it in the conversations we began with, in Republic V and the Theaetetus? The sight-lovers explicitly reject the existence of Forms; so too would Protagoras, whose view Socrates claims to be developing in the Theaetetus. More generally, both figures would reject a hierarchical ontology on which only certain items are fundamental, ultimate, real. It would seem then that Socrates is cheating badly when he puts forth his claim as one that his interlocutors accept. Far from a conceptual truth or endoxon (common view), “epistêmê is of what is” turns out to be a heavily theoretical, deeply controversial doctrine. Are we then forced to choose between rejecting the proposed in­ter­pret­ ation of being and accusing Socrates of egregious deception? I think not. Socrates is indeed talking past his interlocutors in these conversations, but only in a subtle and very in-character way. He thinks that his interlocutors, and indeed all people, do in fact regard epistêmê as cognition of the onto­ logic­ally superior, but that most people have a very weak, metaphysically inadequate view of ontological superiority. He thinks that everyone will agree to the claim that epistêmê is of what really is. On the correct onto­ logic­al theory (he thinks), this will mean that epistêmê is of the ultimate Beings, things which are ontologically superior to other things—things which exist but have lesser ontological status and which (perhaps) are dependent on what is. On other theories—and on implicit, untheorized views—the claim will mean something far less ambitious. I will address the Theaetetus in Chapter  10, arguing that Protagoras hears “epistêmê is of what is” as “epistêmê is of what is really, not merely

Epistêmê is of what is, revisited  109 apparently, the case.” As to the Republic’s sight-lovers, we can see Socrates talking them into a grasp of the notion of ontological superiority, albeit a limited and vague one. Here again is the crucial interchange, now divided into stages: (a) Does the one who has gnôsis have it of something or nothing? . . . — He has gnôsis of something. (b) Something that is or that is not [poteron on ê ouk on]?—Something that is. For how could what is not be the object of gnôsis [gnôstheiê]? (c) Are we then sufficiently assured of this, even if we examine it in many ways, that what completely is is completely an object of gnôsis [to men pantelôs on pantelôs gnôston], and what is in no way is in every way not an object of gnôsis?—Most sufficiently . . .  (d) Well then. If something is such as both to be and not to be, wouldn’t it lie between what purely is and what in no way is?—Yes, between. (476d–477a) If pressed to precisify the claim to which they are agreeing in Section (a)— that epistêmê is of something rather than nothing—perhaps the sight-lovers would say that there must be some object in the world about which one has epistêmê, or perhaps that there is some content to all epistêmê (one has epistêmê that such and such is the case). Socrates does not so press them, and I see no reason to think there is a determinate fact of the matter as to which claim Plato intends. In any case, we are to imagine nothing beyond what is commonsensical and metaphysically tame. What about the claim in Section (b), that epistêmê is of something that is, rather than something that is not? The sight-lovers presumably take this to be nothing but a restatement of the same claim to which they have just agreed. Perhaps we are to think that they have in mind a fused existentialcum-predicative claim: epistêmê is always of something that exists, i.e. something has some properties—not of a total blank. Or that they have in mind a veridical claim (in Kahn’s state-of-affairs sense): epistêmê is always of something that is the case—not of something that is not the case. In Section (c) Socrates strengthens (b)’s claim, with the ‘completely’ ­(pantelôs). I have argued above that he thereby brings out what he has had in mind all along: epistêmê is of what really is, i.e. the ontologically superior, by contrast with the ontologically inferior—a contrast he will make explicit in Section (d). What about the sight-lovers, though—how do they hear this

110  Epistêmê Is of What Is new claim? I submit that they hear it as trivially true. On their unreflective, implicit, and wholly common-sense ontology, there are only two degrees of being (whether that is existence, predication, being the case, or some fusion): total being and total non-being. Anything that is at all is completely. If we ask them about the things concerning which they take themselves to have epistêmê, namely beautiful sights and sounds (or the beauty of these things, or facts about these things or states of affairs including them—whatever Plato takes them to have in mind), “So then do you think that these things are completely?” or even “Do you think these things really are?,” they will certainly say yes. What other option, they might ask scornfully, could there be? It is only in Section (d) that Socrates introduces a challenge to their commonsense ontology. Now he suggests a status between completely (or, here, “purely”) being and totally not-being. Not everything that exists (or has some quality, or is the case) is completely, purely, really. Simply existing (or et cetera) is not enough to merit that status. Now we are in the territory of substantive metaphysics, with Socrates appealing to his distinction between the ontologically superior and the ontologically inferior. Sharper-witted sight-lovers might interrupt at this point, refusing to concede the point: “Everything either is or is not, no in-between!” Or perhaps—and I offer this only as speculation—the only coherent contrast they can imagine between what really is and something inferior is the contrast between reality and appearance, so they take this to be what Socrates has in mind. They follow the ensuing conversation thinking, “We have epistêmê because we know what really is beautiful. Someone who only pays attention to things that merely seems beautiful lacks epistêmê.” If this is right, then Socrates only introduces a substantive disagreement with them—or, perhaps, persuades them of a new view—when he argues that beautiful sights and sounds occupy this in-between status (479c); up until then, he has their genuine agreement. For comparison, imagine the following dialogue: (a*) Does someone who thirsts thirst for something or nothing?— Something. (b*) Something that is drink, or something that is not drink?— Something that is drink, for how could something that is not drink be the object of thirst? (c*) Are we then sufficiently assured of this, that what is completely drink is completely such as to be the object of thirst, and what is in no way drink is in every way not the object of thirst?—Most sufficiently.

The Basic Conception of epistêmê  111 (d*) Well then. If something is such as both to be drink and not to be drink, wouldn’t it lie between what purely is drink and what in no way is drink? The claims in (a*) and (b*) are commonsensical. An agreeable interlocutor will hear the claim in (c*) as commonsensical too, indeed as simply a reiteration of the claim in (b*). It is only in (d*) that things get odd. A sharpwitted interlocutor will baulk; she will say, “Huh? Everything is either drink or not drink; what is drink is completely drink, what is not drink is in no way drink; there is no in-between. You must be working with a strange theory on which some things among those we can drink, or think we can drink, or commonly regard as drinkable, are privileged among the rest as the real drinks. I have no idea what you mean! Or, well, maybe you are just trying to say that some things seem drinkable but in fact aren’t. Sure, go ahead, you may speak that way . . . . ” I have remained neutral about what the sight-lovers think in this conversation, both because I want to show that my interpretation is available to most parties to the debate, and because Plato leaves it very underdetermined. I hope to have shown in any case that we can see Socrates’ basic principle as a claim that they genuinely accept, indeed as something commonsensical, although he soon leaves common sense behind.

7.  The Basic Conception of epistêmê What we have seen is enough to give us an account of Plato’s basic conception of epistêmê. If cognitive kinds are essentially defined by their objects, then epistêmê’s relation to Being is its most fundamental feature. All of epistêmê’s other qualities are somehow explained by this relation. The power of epistêmê and its accomplishments are the way they are because they are directed toward Being. If we are looking for a basic definition of epistêmê— something that answers the question “What is Plato trying to give an account of: knowledge, understanding, Science, or something else?”—this provides an answer. Epistêmê is in its essence cognition of Being. In sum: • Plato took “epistêmê is of being” to be common ground between all who think about epistêmê, arguably a conceptual truth, certainly a truism or platitude.

112  Epistêmê Is of What Is • He inflated this platitude with a substantive metaphysical view: Being is the ontologically superior. • He also inflated it with his epistemological view that cognitive kinds are defined by their objects: he took epistêmê to be, essentially, the kind of cognition suited to grasp Being. If this last claim is correct, then we should expect Plato’s various characterizations of epistêmê throughout the dialogues to be explained by epistêmê’s relation to Being. In the next chapter, I argue that this is just what we find. In Chapter 5, we will seek a better understanding of the notion of cognition of Being, asking how it relates to more familiar cognitive concepts like knowledge, science, and understanding; at the end of the book we will consider why Plato would make it the centerpiece of his epistemology.

4

The Basic Conception of Epistêmê at Work On an objects-based epistemology, each cognitive kind is the way it is because it is that by which we cognize a certain kind of object. All its features are explained by this relation. As we saw in the Introduction, Plato attributes to epistêmê a number of features that are difficult to unify and explain, including some that make it look quite a bit like the modern notion of knowledge, such as being always true, and others that make it look very unlike knowledge, such as requiring the ability to give definitions or being restricted to intelligible Forms. If epistêmê’s defining object is Being, then “cognition of Being” should constitute Plato’s basic conception of epistêmê: we should be able to appeal to this in order to see why he attributes to epistêmê all the various features that he does. In this chapter I aim to show that this expectation is borne out. An important disclaimer: I am not trying to argue here that for each feature of epistêmê, taken on it its own, our account does a better explanatory job than any rivals. (For example, it certainly cannot claim a better ex­plan­ ation for the definitional requirement than the view on which epistêmê ­simply is definitional knowledge!) That is more than I need to show. My aim is to confirm a hypothesis about Plato’s basic conception of epistêmê, a hypothesis for which we have already seen much independent evidence, by showing that it can do the work of explaining all the features Plato attributes to epistêmê. I do in fact think that in many cases our account’s explanations are more compelling than its rivals’, but that is not what I am trying to establish here, and I will not assess each rival explanation on its own terms. We saw in the Introduction that there is something anachronistic, ad hoc, or inadequate about most proposals for epistêmê’s identity. I have argued that Plato’s texts give non-anachronistic, non-ad hoc support for the identification of epistêmê as cognition of ultimate Being; I want now to show that this interpretation is also adequate—that it can do the work.1 1  Compare: if there is a lot of confusing and inconclusive evidence about whodunnit, but then we acquire good independent reason to hypothesize that it was the butler (say, a reliable Plato’s Epistemology: Being and Seeming. Jessica Moss, Oxford University Press (2021). © Jessica Moss. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198867401.003.0005

114  The Basic Conception of Epistêmê at Work I will devote this chapter to Plato’s account of epistêmê in the Two Worlds dialogues; in Chapters 9 and 10, after I have laid out my interpretation of doxa, I will briefly consider the epistemology of the earlier and later dialogues.

1. Truth Plato sometimes says that epistêmê is always true.2 It is easy to hear this as a claim we nowadays make about knowledge, namely that unlike belief it is factive: if S knows that p, it follows that p is true. In the Two Worlds dialogues, however, Plato sometimes makes a stronger, and stranger, claim about the relation between epistêmê and truth: only in epistêmê, never in doxa, do we attain the truth, because the objects we encounter through epistêmê, and only these, are themselves true. This comes out especially in the idea that the philosopher attains her goal of truth only when she makes contact with the Forms, because these alone are true. For example, in the Republic, philosophers alone are “lovers of the sight of truth” (by contrast with doxa-having sight-lovers) (Republic 475e);3 in the Phaedo, the philosopher spends time with the Forms, things which are “true and divine and not the objects of doxa [adoxaston]” (Phaedo 84a); in the Phaedrus, true epistêmê is attained only by those who in the afterlife see the Forms, described as “the true things” or “the truth” (tôn alêthôn, 248c; tên alêtheian, 249b). Philosophers attain epistêmê because they grasp certain special objects, the true ones. The Basic Conception of epistêmê easily explains this exclusive connection between epistêmê and truth, granted one crucial premise: truth tracks being. There is an enormous amount to be said about the relation between truth and being in Plato.4 That the two are closely entwined is however eyewitness reports it), then all we need do is to show that the other evidence is consistent with this hypothesis, and we will have a strong case. We need to show for example that the butler could have left the footprints and also broken down the door, not that the footprints uniquely fit the butler’s shoe size nor even that the broken door shows more of the butler’s typical style than of anyone else’s. 2  For example: there is true and false pistis, but only true epistêmê (Gorgias 454d); epistêmê is un-false, apseudes (Theaetetus 152c). 3  Sight-lovers are “similar to philosophers” but are not “the true ones [τοὺς δὲ ἀληθινούς],” because true philosophers do not love beautiful sights (likenesses of beauty) but instead “are lovers of the sight of the truth [τοὺς τῆς  ἀληθείας . . . φιλοθεάμονας],” i.e. the Form of Beauty. Twice we get the contrast between the true, genuine articles and a likeness: while sham philo­ sophers love sham beauty, true philosophers love the true thing. 4  For detailed treatment see Szaif 1996, summarized in Szaif 2018.

The explanatory requirement  115 abundantly clear, and even without probing the depths of that connection, we get what we need for our purposes here. When Plato uses ‘being’ in the special sense of the ontologically superior (Being), he uses ‘truth’ in a ­similar way, as an exclusive property and indeed defining feature of Being. Indeed, as many have observed, in such contexts ‘ousia’ and ‘alêtheia’ are almost synonyms, and it is common to translate both Greek words ­interchangeably as “reality.”5 The Forms not only are but are also “the true and the divine” (Phaedo 84a); the Forms are the things on which “truth and being shine” (Republic 508d); the objects higher up the Line are more true (Republic 511e); the Form of Beauty by contrast with the perceptibles is “the truth” (Republic 475e); in contemplating the Forms the soul is “seeing what Is and beholding true things” (idousa to on . . . theôrousa talêthê, Phaedrus 247d).6 Thus in his more metaphysical moods Plato will claim that epistêmê alone gets at truth, because he holds that epistêmê alone is of Being. (In Chapter 7.1 we will consider what to make of his claims, in other moods, that doxa can be true.)

2.  The explanatory requirement In the Republic, Socrates characterizes the highest epistemic state as that in which we can demonstrate how the first principle of everything (the Good) is the cause (aitia) of all other beings.7 In the Phaedo, he argues that Forms, contact with which brings wisdom, are the causes (aitiai) of all perceptible phenomena (100c–e). In the Timaeus, Timaeus argues that one who loves epistêmê and nous must study the intelligent cause of worldly phenomena (46d–e). Epistêmê requires a grasp of causes, i.e. of explanations.8 As we saw in the Introduction, such claims—and more often a similar one in the Meno (98a) which we will consider in Chapter 9—have led many to conclude that Plato conceives of epistêmê not as ordinary knowledge, but instead as what philosophers now call understanding: roughly, a systematic grasp of explanatory relations.9 He thinks that to have epistêmê about beauty, 5  See for example Vlastos 1981. 6  See also Republic 519b, 525c, 527b. 7  See especially Republic 517c: one who has grasped the Good “must deduce [συλλογιστέα] that this is the cause [αἰτία] of everything correct and beautiful for all things.” 8  On the Greek notion of aitia as cause and explanation, see for example Vlastos 1969. 9  See Introduction. On the Two Worlds dialogues especially Annas 1981, and Schwab 2016; Burnyeat 1980 finds the view in the Theaetetus, Nehamas 1985 and Schwab 2015 find it in the Meno. (Moline 1981 uses ‘understanding’ to translate ‘epistêmê,’ but is working with a different conception of understanding on which it is less tied to explanation.)

116  The Basic Conception of Epistêmê at Work for example, is not merely to know that certain things are beautiful, but to understand why they are beautiful—because of the Form of Beauty, or ­ultimately because of the Form of the Good. Plato clearly does think of epistêmê as involving understanding. But this does not entail that this is his bedrock conception of epistêmê—that he thinks that grasping explanations is the essential, defining feature of epistêmê. Our interpretation provides a different account of why epistêmê has this feature. Epistêmê is cognition of ultimate Beings, and these, on Plato’s ontology, are the causes of everything else. To grasp Being is therefore ipso facto to grasp explanations.10 Thus the explanatory requirement on epistêmê falls out of the Basic Conception of epistêmê, together with a metaphysical view about the nature of Being: that it has explanatory structure. Does this entail that there is epistêmê of perceptibles after all, insofar as they are explained by Forms? It does not. We can reconcile an account of epistêmê as explanation-grasping with all the evidence we have seen—and will see in Section  4—that it does not apply to perceptibles by following Schwab 2016: Plato thinks that genuine explanatory connections only hold between Forms themselves; the perceptible realm is too messy to admit of genuine explanation. (Nonetheless, grasping Forms will enhance our cognition of perceptibles; I turn to this point in Section 5.)

3.  Clarity, stability, and precision In the Two Worlds dialogues, as well as in others, Plato attributes to epistêmê certain features which he clearly thinks give it value, and in particular ­render it superior to doxa. These are qualities we encountered briefly in Chapter 2 in our discussion of Plato’s like-by-like view of cognition, where I  grouped them together under the name of cleanliness. Epistêmê is clear (saphes: Republic 511e, Philebus 58c–59d), it is precise (akribes: Philebus 58c–59d), and it is stable (bebaion: Philebus 59b, monimon: Meno 98a; it keeps us from wandering: Protagoras 356d–e, Republic 484b and 508d). Plato is not as explicit as one would wish about the meaning of these terms as applied to cognitive kinds. Detailed studies have been made of

10  It is widely recognized that the epistêmê-relevant causes are essences, one candidate for Beings. For example see Gerson on Meno 98a: “the explanation for the truth of a true belief is to be found in the nature or essence [ousia] owing to which something is correctly said to be or to possess an instance of that essence” (2009, 30); for a more general treatment see Vlastos 1969.

Clarity, stability, and precision  117 various of them, with promising proposals about how they should be understood.11 About stability he is fairly explicit: while the person with doxa can be led by persuasion or passions or appearances to change her mind, epistêmê makes its possessor stand her cognitive ground (Meno 98a; cf. Protagoras 356d–e and the pseudo-Platonic Definitions 413c and 414b; Socrates catalogues the ways doxa can be lost at Republic 413a–c). Precision has something to do with accuracy: the Philebus attributes it to the use of measurement by contrast with guesswork (Philebus 56b), so perhaps here the idea is that epistêmê always gets the answer exactly right. Clarity has something to do with freedom from confusion and contradiction (Republic 524c); Lesher (2009, 171) argues that it amounts to “full, accurate, and sure awareness.” The question we need to consider here however is not what these features are, but whether the proposed Basic Conception of epistêmê can account for them, and in fact we can show that it can without offering detailed accounts of the features themselves. For Plato gives an almost explicit argument deriving these features from epistêmê’s relation to Being. It goes like this: (i) Epistêmê is of Being [Basic Conception] (ii) Being is stable, clear, and precise (iii) Cognitive grasps inherit the features of their objects [Like-by-like] (iv) Therefore, epistêmê too is stable, clear, and precise.12 We have seen extensive evidence for (i) in Chapter 3. In Chapter 2.3, we saw evidence for (ii): in the Two Worlds dialogues, Plato characterizes Being by contrast with perceptible Becoming as clear, precise, and stable (Republic 479c, 509d, 529d, Philebus 59b). Plato clearly intends some connection with his frequent claim that Forms are unchanging, eternal, and free from contradictory properties (see especially Republic 479a–b, 524a, 529d–530b, Phaedo 74b–c, Symposium 210e–211b, Timaeus 27d–28a). As with their epistemic counterparts, my aim is not to offer detailed accounts of these features. I want simply to emphasize that Plato consistently at­tri­butes them to Forms: they are the distinctive marks of metaphysical superiority. 11  See for example Lesher 2009 on clarity, Perin 2012 on stability, and Carpenter 2015 on precision. 12  This is the metaphysically explanatory counterpart of the evidential argument discussed in Chapter 2.5, where Plato draws (ii) as a conclusion from the other claims: we can be justified in accepting (ii) on the basis of the other claims, but it is (I argued there) explanatorily prior to claim (iv).

118  The Basic Conception of Epistêmê at Work Chapter 2.3 also presented extensive evidence for (iii): throughout the Two Worlds dialogues, Plato holds that epistêmê inherits its cleanliness from its clean objects. If you attend to things which are stable, clear, and precise, you will have a stable, clear, precise cognitive condition, because the objects are of that kind. (Recall especially Phaedo 79c–d: when investigating what is unchanging, the soul “has ceased its wandering and remains always in the same state, because [hate] it is having contact with things of that sort”; compare Republic 508d and Philebus 59a–b, quoted in Chapter 2.3.) Thus there is strong evidence that in the Two Worlds dialogues, Plato thinks that epistêmê’s cleanliness is entailed by and inherited from its objects. Moreover, the idea has some intuitive appeal, independently of the general like-by-like doctrine of cognition. You cannot fully illustrate a ­precise mathematical formula in a sketchy graph; you cannot adequately represent a sharply delineated object with a blurry photograph or through cloudy vision; you cannot capture a steady situation with a wavering glance. Clear, precise, stable objects are adequately captured only by grasps that share these qualities. If Beings are as clear, precise and stable as Plato’s Forms, then cognition of them—that is, epistêmê—will itself be clear, precise, and stable as well. (We will come back to this idea in Chapter 7, where I will argue that it plays a role in the view that there is no doxa of Forms.) There are other explanations for Plato’s characterization of epistêmê as clean. One might argue that he is simply following tradition (certainly his predecessors and contemporaries consistently characterize epistêmê as clear (saphes)).13 Some take the lesson to be that he is beginning from a conception of epistêmê as a priori or “logically certain” knowledge: out of a penchant for the rationally demonstrable, he recognizes only this kind of knowledge as worthy of attention, ignoring empirical knowledge.14 I have tried to show that the Basic Conception can do the work instead. Psychologically, Plato may have begun from a conviction that epistêmê is clean. Philosophically, he derives that characterization as a conclusion: beginning with the Basic Conception of epistêmê as cognition, and with his metaphysical views about Being, he concludes that epistêmê must be clean.

13  For extensive citations see Lesher 2009.

14  Vlastos 1981, cf. Vlastos 1985.

Restriction to Forms  119

4.  Restriction to Forms As we have seen, in the Two Worlds dialogues Plato seems to restrict epistêmê wholly to the Forms, denying epistêmê of perceptibles. I want now to show that this feature of epistêmê is also explained by the Basic Conception. (I will also argue, against the Content Overlap view, that this means that epistêmê is never about perceptibles.) The argument is very simple: (a) Epistêmê is of Being [Basic Conception] (b) The Forms are the only Beings; perceptibles merely become. Conclusion: Therefore there is no epistêmê of perceptibles. I will not here repeat the evidence for (a), since I discussed it at length in Chapter 3. As for (b), we have seen evidence in the contrasts Plato draws between the Forms, as Beings, and perceptibles as ontologically inferior. (To take just one example, the things we can access through perception are not Beings but instead “come into being and are destroyed without ever really being” (Timaeus 28a); see further all the texts cited in Chapter 1.2 as evidence for the Distinct Objects view, and the texts cited in Chapter 3.3 contrasting Forms and perceptibles.). We also see evidence for (b) in Plato’s claims that the perceptible realm contains less, or no truth—where ‘truth’ is used as almost interchangeable with ‘being.’ (This is what is sometimes called “ontological truth”—not a property of representations, but of their objects; not correspondence to reality, but reality itself.)15 The Forms alone are that on which “truth and what Is shine” (Republic 508d); perceptible things by contrast with intelligibles “partake less in truth and Being”16 (Republic 585d); the perceptible world is less true than the intelligible (Republic 511e); just as there is no sunlight shining in the cave, so there is no truth shining on the perceptible world (Republic 508d); hence those who are stuck there are without experience of truth (alêtheias apeirous, Republic 519b); through the senses we can access nothing true (Phaedo 83b).17 As to the argument from (a) and (b) to the conclusion, we have seen it already in all the Contrast passages we saw which correlate epistêmê with Being while downgrading perceptibles to a lower ontological status (Chapter 3.3). 15  See Szaif 2018. 16  ἧττον ἀληθείας τε καὶ οὐσίας μετέχει. 17  Philosophy encourages the soul not to suppose true anything it finds through the senses, for such things are “perceptible and visible” (Phaedo 83b). A soul duped by the body will think visible things most true (83c; cf. 83d), but in reality it is only by ignoring perceptibles and using intellect on its own that one can grasp “the true and divine” (84a).

120  The Basic Conception of Epistêmê at Work Epistêmê is of what Is; perceptibles have some lesser status; (therefore) the perceptible realm is not the object of epistêmê (but is instead the object of doxa). We get a more elaborate version of this argument—one that provides a rationale for (b)—in the Republic’s two extended arguments for the restriction of epistêmê to intelligibles, the Book V argument that epistêmê is only of Forms, and a less-discussed argument of Book VII (529b–30b). It will help to consider the Book VII passage first. Socrates is discussing the philosophical education that aims at epistêmê. He argues that astronomy will be useful only as an aid to the study of imperceptible things rather than as a direct source of epistêmê. Indeed we cannot acquire epistêmê of the stars and planets in their own right, precisely because they are perceptible: . . . if anyone tries to learn something about perceptibles [tôn aisthêtôn], by gaping up or blinking down, I deny that he would ever learn – for such things admit of no epistêmê. (Republic 529b–c)

The next lines explain why perceptibles cannot be the objects of epistêmê: they are too messy to contain truth, where ‘truth’ is here used in the ontological sense. While the heavenly bodies are the “most beautiful and most precise” of perceptible things (529c), they are not beautiful or precise enough to be true: their motions “fall far short of the true ones . . . which can be grasped by logos and thought [dianoia] but not by sight” (529d). Just as even the most beautiful mathematical diagrams are so deficient that a real geometer “would suppose it ridiculous to investigate them seriously in the expectation of grasping the truth in them [tên alêtheian en autois lêpsomenon],” so too the motions of the stars are so messy that a real astronomer “would regard someone as absurd who supposed that these were always the same and never in any way deviate . . . and sought in every way to grasp the truth [tên alêtheian labein] about these things” (529e–30b).18 Where there is instability and imprecision there is no truth, and therefore no basis for epistêmê. We can represent the argument as follows: (1) Epistêmê is of Being (here, Truth). [Basic Conception] [= (a)] (2) Being is clean. 18  Another philosopher might mean by these claims that there is truth there, but not truth we can grasp; Plato, who as we have seen repeatedly denies that there is truth in the perceptible world, means instead that there is no truth there to grasp.

Restriction to Forms  121 (3) Perceptibles are messy. (4) Therefore, the Forms are the only Beings; perceptibles merely become. [= (b)] Conclusion: Therefore there is no epistêmê of perceptibles. Turning now to Republic V’s powers argument, it is clear that we can interpret it along the same lines. Epistêmê is of what fully Is ((1)–477a). Perceptibles, meanwhile, are too messy to be what fully Is ((2)–(4)): this explains the move from “every beautiful [perceptible] thing is in some way ugly” to “every beautiful thing is between Being and not-being” (479a–c). Only clean Forms have real Being. The epistemological thesis follows: epistêmê is only of Forms, not of perceptibles ((4)–479e).19 Thus our Basic Conception of epistêmê makes sense not only of the Republic’s restriction of epistêmê to intelligible Forms, but also of the actual arguments it offers for that restriction. If we accept the Basic Conception, we should happily join Aristotle, Alexander, Alcinous, and all the others up to the 1960s who found it unproblematic to assign to Plato the view that there is no epistêmê of perceptibles. Because epistêmê is of Being, the perceptible world simply offers no place for it to get a hold. Just as you cannot see sounds because there is nothing visible there, no color, you cannot have epistêmê of perceptible things because there is none of its object there: no Being. Finally, I think it clear that these arguments rule out the Content Overlap reading of epistêmê as well as less subtle Overlap readings. On the Content Overlap view (discussed in Chapter 1.1; see especially Smith 2000 and 2012), epistêmê can be about perceptibles even though it must be acquired through contact with Forms. Thus a philosopher who has acquired epistêmê of Justice by studying the Form can then apply that epistêmê in making ­judgments about particular actions, and thereby have epistêmê about those particular actions: she could for instance have epistêmê that starting a war with Sparta right now would be just. What we have seen however seems to rule out such readings. This is simply not the kind of subject matter about which one can have epistêmê; the whole topic of when to start wars is too unpredictable and messy to be the subject of epistêmê, because it is too 19  “Those who contemplate the many beautifuls, not seeing the Beautiful itself . . . and everything like this, we say that they have doxa of everything, and do not have gnôsis of anything which they have doxa of . . . What about those who contemplate the things which themselves that are always the same? Won’t we say that they have gnôsis, and do not have doxa?” (Republic 479e).

122  The Basic Conception of Epistêmê at Work unpredictable and messy to contain Truth or Being onto which epistêmê can latch. Thus, contra Smith, epistêmê can never be exercised in a judgment of the form “starting a war right now is just;” that is the wrong kind of content. Plato restricts epistêmê to Forms without qualification. Forms are not only epistêmê’s sole input, but also its sole subject matter. It may help to note that this is not such a strange position to hold. Recall Isocrates’ claim that there is no epistêmê of practical matters because the kairos (right occasion) “eludes our epistêmai” (Antidosis 184). There is no stable, universal, precise grasp of the kairos because the areas in which the kairos obtains are messy: areas in which individual cases vary widely, and so there are no precise or universal rules. Compare the kind of thing we say nowadays: “There is no science of human nature,” or “Humor is an art, not a science,” where the claim is that there are no precise, universal laws because the subject matter itself is too messy.20 These are claims about subject matter: a clean grasp simply cannot latch on to a messy domain. Plato’s epistêmê is far cleaner than Isocrates’, or than science as nowadays ­conceived; if these latter are plausibly restricted in their subject matter, so too is Plato’s epistêmê.

5.  Objection: philosopher-rulers’ epistêmê This brings us to an objection that has fueled much of the recent resistance to the Distinct Objects reading of the Republic. The entire political theory of the Republic is predicated on the idea that philosophers’ epistêmê qualifies them to rule. If there is no epistêmê of the perceptible realm, however—no epistêmê of when it is just to start a war, for example—how can epistêmê be useful? Surely (the objection runs), Plato is thinking that good rulers will  have epistêmê about which human institutions and actions are just, 20  For example, in a popular science article about the debate over whether medicine is an art or a science we learn that “Doctors on the far ‘art’ side of the spectrum maintain that every patient and physician is different. Therefore, they believe there is no one right way to treat a patient” (R. Pearl, “Medicine is an art, not a science: Medical myth or reality?” Forbes, June 12, 2014): to deny that medicine is a science is to deny that there are universal rules governing it. Or we may deny that something is a science on the grounds that it is too imprecise and un­stable: “Physics can send a satellite to orbit Jupiter, tell you exactly when it will arrive and the altitude it will orbit at. Economics can barely describe what happened yesterday—and without any particular precision” (B. Ritholtz, “Ten reasons why economics is an art, not a science,” The Washington Post, August 9, 2013).

Objection: Philosopher-Rulers ’ epistêmê  123 beneficial, or fine; therefore epistêmê about such particular, perceptible things must be possible. (For this line of argument see especially Fine 1990 and Smith 2000.) The first response to the objection is that, whether we like it or not, there is clear evidence that even the philosopher-rulers lack the kind of completely stable, clear, precise grasp of the perceptible world of the kind that could qualify as epistêmê. On top of all the evidence we have seen above that such a grasp is impossible, there is also direct evidence about the philosopherrulers’ cognitive condition, in Plato’s account of how the kallipolis first degenerates into timocracy.21 The rulers miscalculate the proper breeding times, for eventually, “although they are wise [sophoi]. . . they will not hit on [the appropriate times for] fertility and sterility through calculation with perception,” and so will conceive children when they ought not (546a–b); these inferior offspring will drag down the city. One can imagine Isocrates agreeing: childbearing is one of those domains in which everything hangs on the kairos, opportune moment, but such matters “elude our epistêmai” (Antidosis 184). Or as Arruzza puts it, “It is the irreducibility of sensible reality to the perfect grasp of reason—its resistance to perfect knowledge— that introduces corruption into the ideal city” (2018, 115). Epistêmê is ­infallible, but the philosopher- rulers’ cognition of the perceptible realm is subject to error; hence this cognition is not epistêmê. The second response is that the problem that motivates these Overlap readings—if epistêmê is exclusively of Forms, how can it be necessary for practical expertise in the perceptible world?—has been much exaggerated.22 Plato himself evidently thinks it no problem at all, and indeed offers a nearexplicit and quite attractive solution. Broadly, the idea is that theory informs practice. More specifically: the perceptible world is an image of the Forms, and therefore epistêmê of the Forms guides, although does not strictly apply to, our dealings in the particular world. That this is Plato’s thought emerges from the discussion that follows closely on Republic V’s powers argument. The argument that the best city must be ruled by philosophers is often treated as if it ends with Book V, but

21  I owe this point to Cinzia Arruzza. 22  Although others have recognized that Plato gives us the resources for a solution. The view I advocate here is similar to what Gonzalez 1996 defends in detail, and compatible with Sedley 2007. It is also strongly suggested by a brief comment from Adam (1902, comment ad 476c): the philosopher-ruler needs epistêmê because he “cannot possibly frame political institutions on the model of Ideas which he does not know.”

124  The Basic Conception of Epistêmê at Work it does not.23 Directly after concluding that only those who contemplate Forms have epistêmê (479e–480a, the last pages of Book V), Socrates goes on to show how it follows that philosophers should rule. The rationale he gives is not that epistêmê applies directly to the perceptible world, but rather that people with epistêmê of the Forms can use Forms as models (paradeigmata) on which to base the city, as an image: [We cannot trust the rule of the city to] those who are deprived of any real gnôsis of each thing that Is, and have no clear model [paradeigma] in their soul, nor are able, just like painters, looking toward the truest thing and always referring things to that and observing it as precisely as possible, in this way also to establish worldly conventions [nomima] about fine things and just things and good things, if they need to be established, and guard and preserve the ones that have been laid down . . . . [So we should choose as rulers] those who on the one hand have come to have gnôsis of each thing that Is, and on the other hand are in no way deficient to the others in ex­peri­ence24. . .  (Republic 484c–d)

The perceptible world is an image and approximation of the intelligible world (an idea we see most elaborately in the Cave allegory and in the Timaeus’ cosmology; see Chapter 7.5 for discussion). Therefore an understanding of the intelligible world gives us an ideal model on which to base our practice in the perceptible world, just as painters use their models to guide them in producing images. Like “painters who use the divine model” (500e), philosophers will use their epistêmê of Justice, Beauty, and the other Forms to make the city and its inhabitants into good images of these—as good as images can be: They will take the city and the characters of people as a tablet . . . and as they work they will look frequently in both directions, toward what is by nature just and fine and moderate and all such things [i.e. the Forms], and also toward the [just, fine, moderate, etc.] which they would instill in humans . . . . And they will erase one part and re-paint another, until as much as possible they have made the human characters insofar as is ­possible dear to the gods.  (Republic 501a–c) 23  This supports the alternate division of the Republic on which the argument that begins in present-day Book V was included in a single book that ran up through the Cave allegory: see Sedley 2013. 24  τοὺς ἐγνωκότας μὲν ἕκαστον τὸ ὄν, ἐμπειρίᾳ δὲ μηδὲν ἐκείνων ἐλλείποντας.

Objection: Philosopher-Rulers ’ epistêmê  125 Moreover, the philosophers’ epistêmê of the Forms lets them use these not only as models on which to mold perceptible images, but also as standards by which to assess them. When they return to the city to rule, like freed prisoners returning from the outside to the cave, the philosophers: will see much better than the people there, and will have gnôsis of [­gnôsesthe] each image, what it is and what it is of, on account of having seen the true things [t’alêthê] about the fine and just and good. (Republic 520c)

This passage is sometimes put forth as decisive evidence that Plato recognizes epistêmê of perceptibles (see especially Fine 1990), and as we saw above the Book V powers argument does use words cognate with gignôskein interchangeably with epistêmê. The verb can also mean to recognize or discriminate, however, and in context that is all that it need mean. When the philosopher first returned to the cave, “his vision was still dim, before his eyes had adjusted” (516e–517a), and he was ridiculed for being bad at the activities the prisoners honor: “sharply observing [kathorônti] the things that pass by, and remembering best which ones are accustomed to go by before, after, or at the same time, and from these things being most capable of predicting what is to come” (516c–d). Once his eyes have adjusted, however, he will “see much better” than the prisoners (520c): he will be better able to recognize or discriminate the shadows. The claim Plato needs at 520c then is not that the returned philosophers have epistêmê of the ­shadows; instead, he is saying that because the rulers have epistêmê of the originals (the Forms), they are very good at recognizing and distinguishing perceptible images of them. Epistêmê of the Forms informs our cognition of the perceptible realm, whether in molding it or assessing it, because the perceptible is an image of the Forms. But this does not mean that there is epistêmê of the perceptible realm itself. Consider again Plato’s claim about the attitude geometers have toward diagrams, or that true astronomers have about the motions of the visible stars: they would think it absurd if someone “sought to grasp the truth [tên alêtheian labein] about these things, which have body and are visible” (Republic 530b). The truth is to be found only in the imperceptible models, not in the visible images. But, as we saw in the previous section, this is just to say that there is epistêmê only of the models, not of the images—precisely the claim Plato makes about the visible stars (529b–c, quoted above: “such things admit of no epistêmê”). Nonetheless, although Plato does not emphasize the point in this particular context, experts will also be the best judges

126  The Basic Conception of Epistêmê at Work of how well the images approximate the truth. Moreover—with some ­practice in the requisite technical skills—they will also be the best at ­producing images. Expert geometers will be the best judges of diagrams, and with some practice will make the best diagrams. The same is true of philosopher-rulers. They cannot have epistêmê of perceptibles, since these do not contain sufficient truth or Being. They can however use their epistêmê of the Forms to judge how well various perceptibles approximate the Forms. Moreover—with some practice in the requisite technical skills, i.e. with political ex­peri­ence (empeiria) (484d, quoted above)—they will be the best at fashioning perceptibles into good approximations of the real things. If this is right, then Plato has a complex view of the philosopher-rulers’ expertise which he does not make fully explicit. Here is an attempt to spell it out. Ruling well—and indeed also living well25—is the business of a special expertise. (He sometimes refers to this as a technê (346a), sometimes as excellence in deliberation (euboulia, 428b), sometimes as an epistêmê in what must be a loose sense equivalent to technê, because in these contexts carpentry and medicine also qualify (428b–c), and sometimes as sophia, wisdom (428b–c);26 I take this to show that he has developed no systematic technical vocabulary here, and I choose ‘expertise’ as sufficiently general.) This expertise has two components. First, a purely theoretical component: epistêmê of Forms. Second, a practical component: excellence in molding, discriminating, and evaluating images of the Forms. This second component is not epistêmê, but it cannot be had without epistêmê: facility with images presupposes familiarity with their originals. Plato gives no name to this second component, nor does he say whether it is automatically entailed by epistêmê or involves some additional process, although he does suggest that it requires experience (empeiria).27

25  Philosophers, whether or not they are rulers, will use their epistêmê of Forms to guide their own behavior in the perceptible world, eschewing unjust actions, pursuing just ones, and so on. 26  See Claudia Yau, work in progress, for an argument that it is best conceived of as sophia. 27  Recall Plato’s comment after describing how the philosopher-rulers will use the Forms as models: we should choose as rulers “those who on the one hand have got to have gnôsis of each thing that Is, and on the other hand are in no way deficient to the others in experience” (484d). And indeed, Plato requires the philosopher-ruler to spend fifteen years in the Cave of political activity, gaining experience, before she becomes a ruler (539e–540a). For good discussion see Vasiliou 2015. Compare Cooper: “To be sure, merely knowing the good will not by itself suffice – at any rate not for knowing how best to run a city. This is why Plato insists that before coming to know the good his rulers must spend fifteen years getting experience in city management (539e2–5). Still, the only part of what [the ruler, or the wise individual]. . . knows that counts, on a strict view as knowledge (the sort that encompasses understanding, of why things are the way they are and how they ought to be) is knowledge of the good-itself,” i.e. of the Form (Cooper 1977, 156).

Objection: Philosopher-Rulers ’ epistêmê  127 Thus theoretical epistêmê of Forms and practical facility with their images are part of the same expertise. This follows a general rule which Plato has proclaimed earlier in the Republic: the ability to know or recognize images “belongs to the same craft and practice [technês kai meletês]” as the ability to know or recognize the originals.28 If we take these to be two distinct components of a single expertise, we have room to acknowledge both that epistêmê is restricted to Forms, and that it is necessary for the expertise of ruling well. We can find a rough parallel in Aristotle’s account of craft (technê). (I here present a contentious but compelling reading of his account, in line with what we find for example in Devereux 1986).29 Aristotle distinguishes two components of a craft like medicine: theory (logos) of the universals, and experience-based judgments about particulars: Regarding action, experience [empeiria] seems not to differ at all from craft [technê]. Indeed those who are experienced succeed more than those who have the account [logos] without experience. For experience is gnôsis of particulars, while craft is [gnôsis] of the universal, and actions and productions are all concerned with the particular: for one does not heal Human, but Callicles . . .If then someone has the account [logos] without the experience, and has gnôsis of [gnôrizêi] the universal but is ignorant of the particular contained in this, he will often make errors. . . (Metaphysics 981a12–23)

One aspect of medical expertise is the logos of the universals: someone who “has the logos” can give an account of Human, for example, for they know the universal essence. There is no corresponding account of the particulars: these are the domain of experience instead.30 Moreover, although Aristotle 28  “And surely if there are images of letters appearing in water or in mirrors or anywhere, we will not recognize [γνωσόμεθα] these before we recognize [γνῶμεν] the letters themselves, but this belongs to the same art and practice . . . [and likewise, when we are well educated in music we will be able to] recognize [γνωρίζωμεν] the forms of moderation and courage . . . both themselves and their images . . . thinking them to belong to the same craft and practice [τῆς αὐτῆς οἰώμεθα τέχνης εἶναι καὶ μελέτης]” (Republic 402b–c). 29  Devereux argues that Aristotelian medical technê strictly speaking is of universals alone, and hence not efficacious in action; what an effective doctor has is a two-part expertise which combines technê of universals with empeiria of particulars. I am not convinced that Aristotle consistently uses ‘technê’ to refer only to the universal component, but I am convinced by the claim that the full, practically efficacious expertise involves both theory of universals and practical facility with particulars. 30  See also the contrast between technê and empeiria earlier in the discussion: it belongs to empeiria to make particular claims about what cured Socrates or Callias, while technê instead makes universal claims about what cures “all people of this sort, divided off in one class [εἶδος]” (Metaphysics 981a10).

128  The Basic Conception of Epistêmê at Work here says that experience without technê—that is, without the universal logos—is more effective in action than the reverse, we can charitably infer that he thinks the combination of the two the most effective of all. Theory is only of universals, and so to be practically useful it must be supplemented by experience of particulars. Experience of particulars on its own is not wholly reliable, however: someone who also has the logos of the universals will have a better grasp of particulars, because they can recognize the particulars as instances of the universal. An excellent craftsperson will have both components: theoretical logos of the universals, practical facility with particulars. Analogously, on the view I am attributing to Plato, the rulers’ expertise consists of theoretical epistêmê of Forms, and practical facility with ­perceptibles.31 Moreover—a point on which Plato will insist much more than empirically-minded Aristotle—the second cannot be had, in its best form, without the first. In spirit, this interpretation is not so different from some that are put forth by Overlappers: epistêmê is primarily of Forms, but someone with epistêmê of Forms can use that to have excellent cognition of perceptibles (see for example Smith  2012 and Fine 1990).32 I agree that possessing epistêmê of Forms allows one to be good at recognizing their images; my disagreement is only with the claim that such recognition is itself an instance of epistêmê. Why bother insisting on the point? First, because it allows a literal reading of all the evidence we have seen that there is no epistêmê about perceptibles (see especially Republic 529b–c on the impossibility of epistêmê of the stars, Philebus 59a–b on the impossibility of stable cognition of unstable things, and all the evidence we saw for like-by-like cognition). Second—and more weightily, since of course Overlappers will find other ways to read these passages—because once we get a fuller grip on the nature of epistêmê, which is the task of the next chapter, we will see that there are perfectly good reasons to restrict this kind of thing to Forms. For now, that must be a promissory note. 31  The analogy is just an analogy: the theoretical logos that Aristotelean doctors have is not at the epistemic level of Plato’s epistêmê. 32  “The power of knowledge [epistêmê] will provide the basis of the most reliable judgments in regard to particulars . . . in applying the power of knowledge, philosophers would make an appropriate connection to one or more Forms . . . which would result in their having the clearest possible concept of justice, which they could then apply in the judgment of instances. Seeing the ‘resemblance’ of Justice in the rule of philosophers [something that belongs to the realm of Becoming], the knower would judge such a rule to be an instance of justice” (Smith 2012, 70).

Objection: Philosopher-Rulers ’ epistêmê  129 If the philosophers’ excellent grasp of perceptibles is not epistêmê, ­ owever, what is it? A natural thought, which some have embraced, is that it h is doxa. On this interpretation, Plato agrees in a way with Isocrates (Antidosis 184 and 271; Against the Sophists 8): the best we can have in ­practical matters is good doxa. After all, perceptibles lack clarity and Being, and thus—by the like-by-like doctrine—the best we can have of them is doxa. This does not entail that the rulers’ cognition of perceptibles is on a level with that of non-philosophers. Philosophers will have doxai that are as good as doxai can be; as Schwab puts it, they will have “expert opinions,” which, though their subject matter condemns them to fall short of epistêmê, are far better than ordinary doxa.33 Certainly it is plausible that doxa of images, when paired with epistêmê of their originals, is superior to ordinary doxa: more stable, more true, more clear. Indeed Plato strongly suggests this claim in the Timaeus, in a famous passage which we saw in part in Chapter 1: This world is a likeness [eikôn] of something [viz., a divine, unchanging paradigm]. . . Accounts are akin to the things they expound. An account of that which is fixed and stable and discoverable with the aid of intellect will itself be fixed and unchangeable, so far as it is possible . . . while accounts of what is made in the image of that other but is only a likeness, will themselves be only likely [eikotas], standing to accounts of the former kind in a proportion: as Being is to becoming, so is truth [alêtheia] to conviction [pistis].34 If then, Socrates, we do not prove able to render accounts which in every way agree with each other and are precise . . . do not be astonished. But if we are able to offer accounts which are no less likely than anyone else’s, we ought to be well pleased . . .   (Timaeus 29b–c)

Accounts of the perceptible world—and, as strongly implied, the cognitive conditions they reflect and can produce—inevitably fall far short of the cleanliness that characterizes epistêmê. Indeed, as Plato here implies and elsewhere in the Timaeus explicitly states, the best we can have about the 33  “[W]e do not think that the doctor can prove that the course of treatment she prescribes is best,” and so we regard her views only as opinions, but we respect them as expert opinions. And “just as we take doctors’ medical opinions to be expert because they are informed by their understanding of health, so too Socrates takes philosophers’ opinions concerning concrete perceptible matters to be expert because they are informed by their epistêmê of Forms” (Schwab 2016, 77–8). 34 For interpretations of this difficult analogy see Burnyeat  2005, Bryan 2012 and Mourelatos 2014.

130  The Basic Conception of Epistêmê at Work perceptible realm is pistis, or doxa (cf. Timaeus 27d–28a, 37b–c and 52a, quoted in Chapter 1.2). Nonetheless, as commentators rightly emphasize (see especially Broadie  2011, 33–38), because the perceptible world is an image of the divine, we can have accounts and views of it that meet an important standard: they are likely (eikos).35 Someone who recognizes the perceptible realm’s status as image of the divine—and presumably even more so someone who has expertise about the paradigm, whether or not Timaeus is claiming that status for himself—can give a better account of the perceptible realm than ordinary cosmologists, although he can never have the highest kind of cognition about it. Likewise, one might argue, ­philosopher-rulers with epistêmê of Forms can have doxai about the ­perceptible realm that are far superior to ordinary people’s. On the other hand, the Republic so downgrades doxa that it is not ­surprising that we never find Plato explicitly attributing it to philosopherrulers, or to wise private individuals.36 Moreover, once I give my account of doxa in Chapters 6–8, we will see some reason to doubt that this is really what he has in mind. Unlike the cave-dwellers and sight-lovers who are Plato’s exemplars of doxa, philosopher-rulers recognize perceptibles as mere images of Forms; in this way, they are much more like people who have something higher than doxa, namely dianoia, “thought” (see 510d–e on mathematicians, discussed in Chapter 7.6). Perhaps then if he had given the matter more attention he would have said that the philosopher-rulers are exercising some cognitive power not yet named: one that, like dianoia, looks back and forth between perceptibles and intelligibles (see again the painter analogy, at 500e–501b), but unlike dianoia is focused on evaluating and improving the perceptibles, rather than on discovering truths about the intelligibles. Indeed, perhaps he would wind up positing a distinction that Aristotle develops, between practical and theoretical reasoning.37 Practical reasoning, or deliberation, shares with doxa a concern with perceptibles, but is distinguished from doxa both by its

35  For discussion of ‘eikos’ as a term of praise, see the articles cited in the previous note, along with Broadie 2011. 36  With one perhaps important exception: the proper youthful education will instill in the rulers a stable, true doxa or dogma that they must protect the city (412e–414a). This is to be secured by a myth (the Noble Lie). Perhaps we are to take it that—unlike the auxiliaries—the rulers will later be able to replace this doxa with something better, but perhaps not. 37 The Republic certainly seems to lack this distinction; for discussion, and contrast with Aristotle, see Devereux 1986 and Silverman 2010.

Objection: Philosopher-Rulers ’ epistêmê  131 exclusively practical orientation, and also by its possibility of perfection, phronêsis.38 Plato will return to and develop the notion of political expertise in the Statesman explicitly and in detail, although in quite a different way, without any appeal to Forms, and with extensive emphasis on the ability to deal with messy, changing affairs (see especially 284a–e and 294a–296e). The Republic’s account is brief, largely implicit, and leaves underdetermined the nature of the practical component: perhaps it is doxa, perhaps something unnamed. The account is nonetheless a coherent one. Moreover, it is one which reconciles a Distinct Objects epistemology with a practical role for epistêmê: epistêmê is required for expert cognition of perceptibles, but is itself only of Forms.

38  See for example Nicomachean Ethics 1140b27.

5

What Is Epistêmê? In answer to the question at the start of this book, I have argued that Plato identifies epistêmê first and foremost as the cognition of a certain kind of object: Being. We do not get at what epistêmê essentially is—at Plato’s fundamental conception—by starting with epistêmê’s resemblances to recognized cognitive kinds like Science, knowledge, understanding, or others; nor do we get there by starting with the intrinsic features in virtue of which it resembles these, such as its clarity, its stability, or its explanatory nature. Instead, I have argued, all these features and resemblances are grounded in the fact that epistêmê is of Being. When we add to this Plato’s metaphysics—his view of the ultimate realities as purely intelligible, as stable, precise, and clear, as essence-like, and as the ultimate causes of all that can be explained—and his like-by-like doctrine of cognition, we get a complete explanation of his characterization of epistêmê. Epistêmê is a cognitive grasp suited to the ultimate realities: that is why it is true, explanatory, stable, clear, and precise, and restricted to the intelligible realm of Forms. Plato may have had independent reason to attribute these features to epistêmê: perhaps he was preserving contemporary views, or privileging philo­soph­ic­al reasoning over perception and experience. But these features are nonetheless philosophically explained by the Basic Conception of epistêmê. Essentially, epistêmê is cognition of Being. This answer may however leave us nonplussed. What sense can we make of this notion, cognition of Being? Is it a radical departure from other interpretations of epistêmê? Is there any intuitive way to characterize it? Does it correspond to anything else in the history of epistemology? Does it cor­res­ pond to anything we recognize or care about now? In this chapter I will offer some answers to these questions. At the end of the book, I will return to offer an account of why Plato would make this notion the centerpiece of his epistemology.

Plato’s Epistemology: Being and Seeming. Jessica Moss, Oxford University Press (2021). © Jessica Moss. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198867401.003.0006

Extant interpretations  133

1.  Extant interpretations To begin with, my interpretation is new but not radical. While there has been no clear recognition of “cognition of Being” as the fundamental def­in­ ition of Plato’s epistêmê, many insightful treatments come close to or fit very well with this account. Certainly older interpretations come close to it in spirit. As I mentioned in Chapter 1, the standard English translation a century ago was ‘Science’ (see for example Bosanquet 1895, Jowett 1908, Taylor 1926, Shorey 1930). This translation is clearly intended to pick up on the Latin Scientia, which in turn stems from Aristotle’s epistêmê. (LSJ’s entry for epistêmê in the ­nineteenth century cites the Republic’s powers argument, along with the Posterior Analytics, as loci for the meaning “scientific knowledge, science” (s.v. epistêmê, A.II.2).) As I will argue briefly below (Section  2), a central feature of these notions is the connection to ultimate reality: Science is or involves the cognition of the essences or other first principles. More recently, as we have seen, some have argued that epistêmê is to be identified with understanding. This too comes close in important ways— especially on the version we find in Schwab 2016, on which understanding is always grounded in essences. Understanding, on this interpretation, requires a grasp of the deep realities that underlie everything else, and its explanatory nature mirrors that of its objects. Closer yet to my view, some identify Plato’s epistêmê as knowledge of essences. Among others, Gonzalez characterizes epistêmê in the Republic as “non-propositional knowledge of whatness (e.g. of what justice is…)” (1996, 27); Silverman construes Forms as essences and restricts epistêmê to Forms (2002); Gerson characterizes epistêmê as “infallible mental seeing of Forms or essences” (2009, 41).1 This type of view has a lot of explanatory power, and also makes for compelling continuity with later epistemology (starting with Aristotle’s nous). Even if we accept the metaphysical thesis that Plato construes Forms as essences, however (and it is not my business in this book to defend this, nor any thesis about the identity of the Forms beyond their status as ontologically superior) I would want to revise or clarify the thesis about epistêmê. It is not that Plato starts from an understanding of 1  Rowett 2018 construes epistêmê as knowledge of “types qua types,” arguably a relation of the essence view.

134  What Is Epistêmê? epistêmê as cognition of essences; instead, he reaches that view as a ­substantive conclusion, derived from the Basic Conception of epistêmê together with the metaphysical view that the Beings are essences. My account is perhaps closest to what we find in Moline: epistêmê is “an understanding of real objects” (1981, 119)—or more picturesquely in Crombie: it is “a devouring of something real” (1962, vol 2., 42). I have argued that the epistemically relevant sense of ‘being’ is something like ul­tim­ate reality, and I think Crombie and Moline have got this part just right. Their interpretations wind up however being too narrow, on my view: they define the real as the contrast to copies or likenesses, while I think Plato works in different contexts with different notions of the real—that is, with different contrasts between the ontologically superior and inferior. So like the essence view, this view captures part of the truth about epistêmê, but a part that needs to be grounded in the more general and fundamental fact that epistêmê is cognition of Being.

2. Counterparts The notion of cognition of Being is not sui generis: it has historical ­counterparts—precedents and descendants—which can help us to understand it. This becomes clearest when we remind ourselves of the basic premises of this notion: first, that there is some privileged level of reality; second, that an adequate grasp of this level will have certain features that suit it to the role, and thus that it will be appropriately impressive in its own right. Once we put it like this, we can recognize various counterparts. One is the notion of a special power or state of my mind by which we penetrate through superficial appearances to get at the underlying reality. (The relevance of this notion will be confirmed by our account of doxa as cognition of what seems or appears.) Scholars find such an idea at work in two of Plato’s most influential predecessors, Parmenides and Heraclitus: nous is “a direct of view of reality,” while doxa is stuck with what seems.2 Another historical counterpart—logically independent of the first, although sometimes joined with it—is the notion of a special, deep understanding of the foundational ontological items that underlie and explain all the rest. Arguably this notion was already at work in the Ancient

2  See among many others Lesher 1994 and von Fritz 1994, 26, 33, 40–1.

Counterparts  135 conception of what we would call a science, like medicine or geometry—for which they used the word ‘epistêmê.’ The person with epistêmê about a given domain grasps the fundamental truths or beings in that domain; they go beyond superficial phenomena to grasp underlying causes and ultimate principles.3 Certainly that is how Aristotle understands the sciences (epistêmai): the scientist has a grasp of the ultimate realities in the domain, the essences that ground all the rest. (See for example Posterior Analytics I.2, I.14, II.3.) Indeed, we can identify a very close cousin or descendant of Plato’s epistêmê in Aristotle’s nous. For Aristotle too has the idea that there are special ontologically privileged items which most of all are—the primary beings simpliciter, or the primary beings in a given domain like biology or geometry—and corresponding to that, the idea that there is a special ­epi­stem­ic­al­ly privileged power, the power of grasping these (see Posterior Analytics II.19). We see this same idea developed in the Neoplatonists’ Science of Being: nous is direct apprehension of Being, where Being again is the ontologically superior (see e.g. Plotinus Ennead V.1.4, or Proclus, In Parmenidem I.617). We also see it in the medieval theory of Scientia, and from there in the early moderns’ notions of Science or Knowledge as cognition of fundamental entities—essences.4 On all these views there is a special kind of knowledge or cognition very different from ordinary knowledge and very much worth having; what makes it special and valuable is that it is cognition of the fundamental realities. As for modern counterparts of epistêmê, there are many possible candidates. Physics, theology, and foundational metaphysics could each make a claim to be epistêmê’s heir: the ultimate science of the ultimate reality. For while we might say that the expert physicist and the expert numismatist have the same cognitive condition (knowledge, or understanding) with regard to different objects, we might instead say that the physicist has something special, a deep understanding, or a specially systematic and 3  See discussion of “rationalist” doctors, in for example Frede 1990. 4  For example, in Spinoza the highest form of cognition involves grasping a thing “through its essence alone” (Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect 19); for Leibniz the highest form involves apprehension of necessary, eternal truths which are grounded in essences, and ultimately in God (Monadology 29–45). Carriero 2013 argues at length that Descartes, Spinoza, and Leibniz all construed the highest cognition as cognition of essences. For a similar treatment of some medieval philosophers with explicit comparison to Plato, see Wolterstorff 1996 (quoted in the Introduction): “the medievals were at one with Plato in their understanding of epistêmê,” because for them too epistêmê is a grasp of “what is fully real . . . the necessary, eternal, immutable” (1996, 220–1).

136  What Is Epistêmê? ex­plana­tor­ily powerful one, and that this is due to the fact that what she studies is nothing less than the foundations of reality. Or we might think that the metaphysician has this, if we think of metaphysics as “an attempt to know reality as against mere appearance, or the study of first principles or ul­tim­ate truths” (Bradley 1908, 1), aiming at “deep truth, profound understanding—fundamental principles” (Horwich 2012, 24). If those descriptions have some appeal to you, you are working with a notion directly descended from Plato’s epistêmê.

3.  A deep grasp of ultimate reality Considering these counterparts of epistêmê helps us get an intuitive characterization of the notion of cognition of Being. Although it is far from being the centerpiece of modern epistemology (see next section), neither is it a technical or archaic notion to which we can find no connection. We can think of epistêmê as a deep grasp of ultimate reality. Whether or not you accept the existence and importance of such cognition will of course depend on your attitude to the notion of ultimate reality. In any case, however, we can understand the idea—and recognize it, as I have just argued, in the selfconception of some students of special disciplines like physics or metaphysics or theology. It is the idea of penetrating through superficial phenomena to get at the underlying nature of things, and in the process of reaching a level of clarity and insight far beyond that of ordinary thought. One might reject the notion of ultimate reality altogether, maintaining that everything that exists is on the same ontological footing. Or one might accept the metaphysical idea but deny that a grasp of ultimate reality is possible, or that it is valuable. Or one might argue that such a grasp is simply knowledge, differing from other kinds of knowledge in its subject matter but  not constituting a distinct, special epistemic kind. All these would be reasons to reject Plato’s notion of epistêmê. I am not making the case that we should reincorporate this notion into our epistemology, let alone make it the centerpiece. I am arguing that we can recognize what he is talking about. Epistêmê, understood as cognition of Being, is not a narrowly technical notion, nor one that has life only within Plato’s specific metaphysical system. Instead it is his version of an idea that has had appeal throughout history and has its appeal to plenty of thinkers today: a deep grasp of ultimate reality.

Epistêmê and knowledge  137

4.  Epistêmê and knowledge I began in the Introduction with the observation that many philosophers today interpret Plato’s epistêmê as knowledge, either defending this interpretation explicitly or assuming it without argument. I have tried to show that this interpretation is at best unhelpful: if we begin from our modern intuitions and theories about knowledge, and try to read these into Plato’s epistêmê, we not only create problems for ourselves in trying to make sense of many of his characterizations, but also wind up missing out on his real starting point: the objects-based account of epistêmê as cognition of Being. Now that we have fleshed out that account, however, it is worth going back to the question of epistêmê’s relation to knowledge. Is the upshot that epis­ tem­olo­gists today have completely changed the subject, so that they are no more part of a conversation with Plato than—one might argue—ethicists who focus on the question of right action rather than the question of the good life? Or can we see knowledge, as it is understood and discussed today, as a descendant or cousin of Plato’s epistêmê, such that contemporary the­or­ ies of knowledge and Plato’s theory of epistêmê might be mutually illuminating? A full answer to this question would be a large project, requiring a detailed study of contemporary epistemology’s notion of knowledge, which I will not here undertake.5 But some brief remarks may help indicate how one might try to connect our contemporary notion of knowledge with Plato’s notion of epistêmê. I argued in Chapter  3 that Socrates takes it as a basic principle about epistêmê, common ground between himself and even his most anti-Platonic of opponents, that epistêmê is of what is. He thinks that the right way to understand this principle is in terms of an account of “what is”—Being, the ontologically superior—which his opponents do not share. We can however take them to be working with a deflated cousin of that notion: reality, how things in fact are (see Chapter 3.6). When the Republic’s sight-lovers agree that epistêmê is of what is, they are plausibly thinking that someone with epistêmê is in touch with all the relevant facts in the domain, or all the things that are beautiful—the things that are there to be known. The 5  The following draws on Moss 2019, which poses and answers the question in a bit more detail. Fine (forthcoming) has an interesting treatment of the issue: using a distinction from Rawls, she argues that Plato shares our concept of knowledge and works with a different conception.

138  What Is Epistêmê? Theaetetus’ Protagoras is thinking that someone with epistêmê is in touch with how things really, rather than merely apparently are. When contemporary epistemologists take as a basic principle about knowledge that it is factive, we can very plausibly take the notion of the facts, or the truth, or true propositions, as ways of developing this general notion of reality. Plato would of course think these the wrong ways: too topic-neutral, too independent of the metaphysical distinctions he thinks central to epistemology. Nonetheless, we can recognize these as a different version of his own idea. Thus we can think of modern knowledge and Plato’s epistêmê as two developments of a common, basic idea, the idea of an especially good cognitive relation to reality. On the modern version, there is no commitment to metaphysically privileged objects, but only an appeal to the notion of facts, or true propositions. Somehow a shift occurred: philosophers ceased to center epistemology around the idea of a relation to special objects, and instead began to think of it as a relation to facts. The result is that the notion of knowledge becomes in principle divorced from metaphysics—or, more precisely, independent of it. This is obviously related to the idea that most philosophers now think of knowledge as an attitude toward propositions or facts, whereas—I am arguing, in line with many others—Plato thought of epistêmê primarily as a relation to objects. As I argued briefly above (Chapter 2.5), this is thoroughly consistent with him holding that epistêmê is a prop­os­ition­al attitude, which indeed I am inclined to think that he does. (Here I am sympathetic to Fine 2004.) The point is that on Plato’s view, to understand epistêmê we need to know not in the first instance that it is of true propositions, but rather that it is about a certain kind of object. (Likewise, one might agree that mathematical knowledge is propositional, while holding that any account of what mathematical knowledge is must make essential reference to its subject matter.) Why did epistemology shift its focus from objects to propositions, from the special subject matter of Being to the topic-neutral notion of propositions, from the deep nature of reality to the flat notion of facts? That is a larger question than I can take on in this book, but considering why Plato focuses on objects will provide an important part of the explanation.

5. Why epistêmê? Understanding the notion of cognition of Being leads us to a very im­port­ ant question: why take this as the privileged kind in one’s epistemology?

Why Epistêmê?  139 Why do epistemology this way at all, rather than starting from the kinds we recognize nowadays, or from intrinsic, purely epistemic features like clarity or stability? Why base one’s conception of the privileged cognitive kind on its objects, and specifically why choose as the relevant objects Beings? The answer to this question will involve an answer to the wider question about Plato’s epistemological project, and we must thus postpone it until we have given an account of Plato’s inferior cognitive kind, doxa. Here however is a brief preview of what I will argue in the Conclusion. Plato’s epistemology, like all his philosophy, is driven by ethical concerns, and in particular by an overarching ethical question we see at work throughout the dialogues: how should one live? His answer to this ethical question depends on a meta­ phys­ic­al conviction that there are ultimate realities—Beings—the appropriate kind of contact with which constitutes living well. Moreover, he thinks that such contact is cognitive. When he turns his attention to cognitive conditions, therefore—to what we call epistemology—his ideal, the priv­il­eged kind he wants to explain and recommend, the kind he dignifies with the title epistêmê, is the cognitive grasp of Being.

6

Doxa Is of What Seems What kind of thing is Plato’s doxa? This is a question nowadays rarely asked.1 It is widely assumed that Plato had in mind something perfectly familiar to us from commonsense contemporary epistemology: belief. More precisely, the widespread view—reflected in standard translations and background assumptions as well as sometimes in explicit discussions— is that Plato uses ‘doxa’ to refer to two related cognitive phenomena, each of which philosophers now refer to with the English word ‘belief.’2 First, what we might call opinion: a deficient cognitive attitude, one that falls short of knowledge due to inadequate grounding or subjective uncertainty. When Plato denigrates doxa and sharply contrasts it with epistêmê, as for example in the central books of the Republic, he has in mind opinion. Second, generic believing, or “judgment”: taking something to be true. When Plato describes doxa in neutral, non-pejorative terms, for example as the internal analogue of assertoric speech (Theaetetus 189e–190a, Sophist 263e–264a, Philebus 38b–39a), and when he construes epistêmê as not excluding doxa, but instead as consisting in true doxa “with a logos” (Theaetetus 201c–d), he has in mind judgment.3 If my arguments in Chapters 1 and 2 are correct, however, these in­ter­pret­ ations are deeply problematic. For doxa, just like epistêmê, must be understood fundamentally as the cognition of a certain kind of object: there are certain things which are qualitatively similar to doxa, and doxa is in its essence the power to cognize these. Neither judgment nor opinion as 1  A notable recent exception is Vogt 2012. If we go back fifty years and more we find much more interest in the question, and a variety of compelling theories on which I will be drawing: for example Cornford 1941, Crombie 1962, Gulley 1962, Sprute 1962, Havelock 1963. 2  I leave aside the question of whether ‘doxa’ on this interpretation—or for that matter the English word ‘belief ’—is simply ambiguous between these two senses, or always means the latter but sometimes connotes the former through implicature. 3  For these two senses of doxa see for example Sprute 1962 and Vogt 2012. Fine finds both senses in the Republic’s powers argument: “In arguing that knowledge but not belief implies truth, Plato is distinguishing knowledge as such from belief as such, where this leaves open the possibility that knowledge is a species of belief. However, at some points in the argument he uses ‘belief ’ [doxa] for mere belief: for belief that necessarily falls short of knowledge” (2010, 325). Plato’s Epistemology: Being and Seeming. Jessica Moss, Oxford University Press (2021). © Jessica Moss. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198867401.003.0007

Doxa is of What Seems  141 ­ ow­adays understood, however, are individuated or defined by their objects n at all. They are object-neutral attitudes. One can have beliefs, in either sense, about anything whatsoever; there is no special quality that makes something the kind of thing we can have beliefs about. Moreover, there is no likeness or kinship between belief and its objects: one can have shaky, uncertain, vague beliefs about the most stable and clear truths; one can have firm, unwavering beliefs about the most fleeting affairs. (Recall that this is not simply an issue about whether or not doxa is a propositional attitude: if my arguments are correct, then if doxa is a propositional attitude, it is distinguished from other propositional attitudes by being about objects of a certain sort.) The arguments of Chapters  1 and  2 thus suggest that doxa is radically different from belief as understood today—different enough that we do not do well to develop an account of doxa by relying on our views about belief. Instead, we should begin from the idea that doxa is the cognition of a certain kind of object. My aim in the current chapter is to develop an account that meets this criterion; later in the book I will go on to argue that this account can make sense of Plato’s characterizations of doxa throughout the dialogues. I will argue that Plato’s doxa is indeed essentially to be understood as the cognition of a special kind of object, one which can be identified in two fundamental ways. First, what will sound to our ears like a mainly epis­ temo­logic­al characterization: doxa is of what seems. Second, an obviously metaphysical characterization: doxa is of the ontologically inferior counterpart of epistêmê’s object, whatever way the contrast is drawn. I will show that these two characterizations are deeply unified, for it is one of Plato’s central views—most radically developed in the Two Worlds dialogues, but present from the start—that Being does not seem, while what seems is not what Is. The ontologically superior is hidden, obscure, inaccessible without difficult intellectual work—as most dramatically symbolized by the journey out of the Cave. Meanwhile, what is readily manifest and accessible to the human mind, what strikes us as clear and true and real when we are not engaged in any radical questioning, turns out to be the ontologically ­in­fer­ior—as most dramatically symbolized by the shadows that appear so real to the prisoners in the Cave. The object of epistêmê is what Is but does not readily appear; the object of doxa is what readily appears, but is not what Is. Together with the like-by-like doctrine of cognition, this yields a Basic Conception of doxa as cognition of what seems. With the metaphysical developments of the Two Worlds dialogues, doxa becomes a cognitive

142  Doxa Is of What Seems condition specially suited to grasp the murky, messy, perceptible realm of Becoming. This account thus explains doxa’s restriction to perceptibles in the Two Words dialogues, and also the other central features Plato at­tri­ butes to doxa (Chapters 7 and 9). Identifying doxa’s defining object as what seems will thus yield an answer to our starting question: what is Plato’s basic conception of doxa? I consider the resulting picture in Chapter 8. We will find that doxa does not cor­res­ pond precisely to anything in our epistemology, although it is something like empirical cognition, and something like delusion. Although it has something in common with judgment, and a good deal in common with opinion, there are significant differences too, and we only understand the notion adequately when we begin, not from the assumption that doxa is like belief, but instead from the characterization of doxa as cognition of the ontologically inferior things that seem. In the Conclusion, I consider why Plato would make this the salient inferior kind in his epistemology. One important note is in order before I begin to develop my account. Some might think this whole project obviously misguided, on the grounds that doxa simply has to be belief. Belief is such a central epistemological concept that anyone who does epistemology must be concerned with it, and the only candidate for it in Plato’s system is doxa; ill fits with our usage are thus to be explained by quirks in Plato’s theories of belief, not by a radical difference in topic. I agree that Plato recognized and often referred to something very like our modern concept of belief. Along with his predecessors and con­tem­por­ ar­ies, he often uses the verbs ‘hêgêsthai’, ‘oiesthai,’ ‘nomizein’ and ‘hupolambanein’ in ways we would translate with ‘believe’ or ‘think.’ They sometimes use ‘doxa’ and its cognate verb, ‘dokein,’ in this way too, but even a brief survey suffices to show that they often use them with much narrower connotations: connotations of mere seeming (Section 3 below). I will argue that when Plato uses ‘doxa’ to pick out the salient inferior counterpart to epistêmê, he has these connotations in mind. In Chapter  8 I will consider the connections between Plato’s doxa and our modern notion of opinion. As for the more general notion of belief as judgement, it seems that throughout most of the dialogues Plato had little interest in theorizing it at all, let alone under the rubric of doxa.4 In later 4  In the Republic Plato does recognize doxa and epistêmê as belonging to a common genus, just as we class opinion and knowledge together as kinds of belief, but he has little to say about the genus, and names it only with very broad terms that cover many non-cognitive states

Doxa and seeming  143 dialogues, the Theaetetus, Philebus, and Sophist, we do arguably find him developing this notion, and using ‘doxa’ to name it.5 I will say something about this later development in Chapter 10, but my main focus throughout is on the notion that is, I shall argue, central to the epistemology of the Socratic and Two Worlds dialogues: inferior, deficient cognition, which Plato understands, I will argue, as cognition of what seems.

1.  Doxa and seeming In Chapter 3 I argued that epistêmê’s defining object is Being, where Being is a contrast notion, dependent on the distinction between a superior and an inferior level of reality. As we saw there in Contrasts 1–4, Plato has various ways of describing the inferior domain: for example, what Becomes, or the many F things, or or images. I will show in this chapter that there is one characterization which unifies the rest; it is moreover one that Plato would have thought too obvious to need special emphasis as the unifying one, because he would have plausibly thought of it as part of the very concept of doxa, or at least as a basic principle in need of no argument. The unifying idea is that doxa is of what seems, by contrast with what really is. Doxa is the noun formed from the verb dokein, standardly translated ‘to seem.’ On one prominent use, a thing’s doxa is the way it seems to others: a person’s doxa for example is her reputation. Dokein with the dative means “to seem to…,” and so a person’s doxa in a second sense—the sense contrasted with epistêmê—is how things seem to her. Traditionally the former is called the objective and the latter the subjective sense of doxa (see for ex­ ample Bosanquet  1895, 209 and Havelock  1963, 250–51). To avoid un­neces­sar­ily confusing connotations6 I will characterize the former sense as the object-sense, or as referring to “what seems,” and the latter as the subject-sense; for discussion see the end of this section. (For convenience,

(dunameis, 477b–d; pathêmata, 511d). See Moss and Schwab 2019 for a fuller argument for this claim. 5  As many have argued: see for example Gulley  1962, Sprute  1962, Vogt  2012, Moss and Schwab 2019. 6  Since “objective seeming” may sound paradoxical, and “subjective seeming” tautologous.

144  Doxa Is of What Seems when the contrast is not salient, I will continue to use ‘doxa’ without ­qualification to pick out the subject-sense—as I have done up to now.) Given this etymology, it is thus built into the meaning of doxa in the subject-sense that it is a response to what seems. If we are looking for the object of doxa, that which stands to doxa as color does to sight and Being to epistêmê, we might therefore naturally turn to Plato’s notion of what seems. It is certainly possible that we would find nothing of significance here: perhaps Plato uses doxa without intending to emphasize this connotation, or perhaps he construes seeming so neutrally that by “how things seem to S” he understands nothing more than “what S thinks is the case” or “what S holds true,” so that doxa is simply generic belief. Indeed, the words do sometimes work this way. I will argue that when in the later dialogues Sophist and Theaetetus Plato uses ‘doxa’ as a label for “silent speech,” asserting something to oneself, he may well be appealing to a neutral sense of seeming: one’s doxa is how things seem to one, i.e. generic belief (see Chapter 10.3). This, however, turns out to be an exception to the norm—a secondary sense of seeming and of doxa. Throughout the dialogues, and particularly in the Two Worlds dialogues, Plato makes use of a metaphysically loaded notion of what merely seems, by contrast with the true or real, and he has a correspondingly loaded notion of doxa not as generic belief, but as a response to such appearances. In making this argument I am closely following the interpretation of doxa advanced by F.M. Cornford in a series of works from the 1930s and 1940s, and occasionally suggested by others.7 As Cornford puts it in his commentary on the powers argument in Republic V: Doxa and its cognates denote our apprehension of anything that ‘seems’: (1) what seems to exist, sensible appearances, phenomena (2) what seems true, opinions, beliefs, whether really true or false; (3) what seems right, legal and deliberative decisions, and the ‘many conventional notions’ of current morality (479d…)  (Cornford 1941, 176) 7  The idea appears in Cornford 1933, 1935, 1937, 1941. Others too have sometimes noted the significance of doxa’s etymology. Vogt makes note of the point early in her discussion of Plato’s doxa, using it to suggest a connection that I will defend at length in Section 3: “It is helpful to recall the closeness of the Greek doxa with notions of seeming, appearances, and reputation. The verb dokein means ‘to appear,’, and doxa thus often denotes something in the domain of appearances . . . If the Republic is read in Greek rather than translation, Book I is strikingly continuous with the metaphysics of the middle books: doxa is associated with the domain of appearance and perception, and contrasted with the domain of being” (Vogt  2012, 11–12). Compare Bosanquet’s comment on Republic 476d: doxa is “ ‘Opinion’ or ‘seeming;’ the substantive corresponding to the everyday Greek phrase ‘it seems to me,’ and conveying a suggestion of difference from truth or reality” (1895, 209).

Doxa and seeming  145 Since Cornford tends to assert his interpretation more than to argue for it, however, and since it has not had sufficient influence, I find it worth ­resurrecting, defending, and developing the view in some detail here. A clarification is in order before I turn to the evidence. It may seem a mistake to speak of an ontological category of seemings that could serve as the object of doxa. In other words, it may seem a mistake to take the straightforward semantic distinction between object and subject senses of ‘doxa’ to track a distinction between metaphysical seemings out in the world and epistemic seemings in the mind. For one might argue that all seemings are mental: claims of the form “x seems F” always reduce to claims of the form “S has an impression as of x being F.” I will nonetheless speak of object-doxa and subject-doxa as distinct categories, and this for several reasons. First, clarity: Greek does distinguish between object and subject senses of ‘doxa,’ and my arguments below turn on the close connection in which Greek thinkers use these two. The simplest way to put this is that they construe subject-doxa (being seemed-to) as a response to object-doxa (what seems): a person has doxa when she attends not to things as they are, but to something else, what seems. So that is how I will talk. For much of the time, the reader is welcome to take this as only a way of talking: to take all talk of object-doxa as shorthand for talk of something subjective. If this is as far as we go, we can take the idea that doxa is of what seems to mean that doxai are superficial judgments based on how things affect or strike us, rather than judgments that correct for perspective, question appearances, or other­wise penetrate to the nature of things. For the most part this will suit my purposes very well. There is also however a more substantive reason for embracing talk of object-doxa: Plato holds that there is an ontological realm of seemings or appearances, things which are distinct from what is ultimately real or true, but which nonetheless have some mind-independent existence. His ca­non­ ic­al examples of seemings (which we will see in the next section) exemplify this status: façades, images, and reputations are distinct from the real things they imitate or mask, but they belong on the object side of the object-subject divide; they are not merely a matter of how things strike a subject.8 We will 8 Not merely: perhaps the best way to construe Plato’s notion of object-seeming is as a response-dependent one: for x to seem F is for x to have the tendency to produce impressions of its being F in certain subjects. This tendency or disposition would however be rooted in response-independent features of the object. For example: two sticks tend to appear to us to be both equal and not equal because they are, in themselves, changeable and imperfect (Phaedo 74b). For a compelling defense of the notion of objective seeming, see Gabriel Lear (work in

146  Doxa Is of What Seems see the same in his characterizations of the perceptible realm as something that is not the real thing (what Is), but also not an illusion—instead, more like a shadow or image, things which again have some mind-independent existence (see Chapter 7.5). All this suggests that there are facts about what seems rooted in something outside our minds, and it is thus not only intelligible but even non-metaphorical to speak of an ontological realm of seeming, something that can serve as the object of doxa just as color serves as the object of sight or Being as the object of epistêmê. Although I suspect that most of what I have to say about doxa can be secured on the reductivist, metaphorical interpretation of object-doxa, it is worth noting that Plato shows many signs of embracing the literal one.

2.  What seems Seeming in its object-sense is a contrast notion: it is one half of an antithesis, defined in opposition to being or, sometimes, truth.9 Dokein and einai are frequently presented in Greek texts as a contrasting pair, like logos/ergon or nomos/phusis. To take two representative examples: “He wished not to seem the best, but to be so”10 (Aeschylus, Seven Against Thebes 592–4, referred to at Republic 361b–362a); “You who both are and seem to be the first among the Greeks”11 (Gorgias, Palamedes 33). Although as the latter passage shows, seeming and being can converge—things often seem just as they are—there is nonetheless a conceptual distinction between the two. We also find an antithesis between doxa and truth, alêtheia—which is not surprising, given the frequent near-equivalence between truth and being (see Chapter 4.1). Consider the division of Parmenides’ poem into two sections, Alêtheia and Doxa, or a more mundane example from Antiphon: For the doxa of the things done is advantageous for those who are able to speak, but the truth is advantageous for those who do just and pious things.  (Antiphon, Second Tetralogy 3.2.2)

progress): for Plato, appearing is “a matter of a thing’s showing or displaying itself and the appearance constituted by this activity is there for minds to register….” 9  In Chapter 3.4 I argued that the contrast with seeming is not part of the very concept of Being, for Plato. This asymmetry is fitting, given the derivative status of seemings. 10  οὐ δοκεῖν ἄριστος ἀλλ’ εἶναι θέλει. 11  τοῖς πρώτοις οὖσι τῶν Ἑλλήνων καὶ δοκοῦσιν.

What seems  147 In all these contexts, the claim that x seems has two implications: (1) it is easy to form an impression that x is a certain way—x strikes us that way vividly or manifestly; (2) this does not entail anything about how things really are.12 (Note that there are other words that function this way in Greek: phainesthai, “appear,” and eoikein, “be like,” with adjectival and nominal cognates. At various points in the corpus Plato uses these words as he often uses doxa and dokein.13 I focus here on doxa because it is Plato’s most ­frequently used term for the seeming that is opposed to being—and his most frequently used term for that seeming’s subjective correlate, as we will see below.) In some contexts, the contrast between seeming and being is sharpened into an opposition: how things seem is a very deceptive guide to how they are; a thing’s seeming (its doxa in the object-sense) is a façade that is not only ontologically distinct but also qualitatively very different from its being. For some everyday examples, see LSJ s.v. dokeô I.4 “seem, pretend.” We also find significant instances of this use in the works of some of Plato’s influential predecessors. Parmenides contrasts “the unshaken heart of ­persuasive truth” with “the things that seem [ta dokounta]” (B1.28–32). Xenophanes concurs: Now what is clear, no man has known/seen [iden] nor will any know it, concerning the gods and about all the other things that I am saying. For even if he should completely succeed in describing things as they come to pass, nonetheless he himself does not know; seeming [dokos] is wrought over all.  (Xenophanes B34)

12  Compare Shakespeare’s Hamlet: “Why seems it so particular with thee? – Seems, madam! nay it is; I know not ‘seems’ ” (Hamlet Act I scene 2). 13 The eikos, in place of to dokoun, is contrasted with truth and presented as the object of doxa in Xenophanes B35 (“Let there be doxa of these things [δεδοξάσθω] as resembling the true things [ἐοικότα τοῖς ἐτύμοισι]” and in Parmenides B8.50–62: “Here I end my trustworthy account and thought about truth. Learn now from this point mortal doxai, hearing the deceptive ordering of my words….I declare to you this arrangement to be wholly resembling the truth (ἐοικότα), so that no judgment of mortals will ever surpass you.” Plato picks up on this use in the Timaeus (29b–d, discussed in Chapters 2.3 and 4.5) and in the Phaedrus (orators see that eikota are more honored than truths, 267a). The eikos in these contexts, and to phainemenon or phantasma throughout the dialogues, function in the object sense (to characterize things that seem) with connotations (1) and (2). They also have their subjective counterparts: eikasia in the Republic (511d) and phantasia in the Sophist (264a). There is also pithanon and its subjective correlate, pistis, which sometimes shows up in place of doxa (Gorgias 454d) or alongside it (Timaeus 37b). On the eikos in Plato and his predecessors see Bryan  2012 and Mourelatos 2014.

148  Doxa Is of What Seems Heraclitus agrees too: “The most seemingly good [reputable] of them recognizes and guards [only] what seems”14 (B28)—by contrast, it is ­ implied, with truth. Most dramatically, the poet Simonides says that ­seeming “fights against truth”15 (fr. 76). Plato himself makes extensive use of this notion of seeming throughout the dialogues. The Republic is particularly rich with instances.16 The contrast between really being just and merely seeming so pervades the first part of the dialogue: it is central to both Glaucon’s challenge and Socrates’ response (see specially 358a, 361a–362c, and 367b–d). In developing his brother’s challenge Adeimantus even quotes the line we just saw from Simonides: [Someone raised on popular culture will think that] my being just, if I do not also seem so [dokô], is no benefit . . . but a godlike life is said to belong to the unjust person who has prepared a seeming [doxa] of justice [viz., a reputation]. Surely, if “seeming,” as the wise show me, “even fights against truth,” and is lord of happiness . . . I must draw a shadow-painting of virtue around myself in a circle as a front and a façade [prothura kai schêma]. . .  (Republic 365b–c)

The first part of Republic also emphasizes this contrast between being and seeming in other domains: the arguments turn on contrasts between real and seeming friends (334c–335a), between what seems to be to the ruler’s advantage and what really is (340c), between seeming to persuade people and really persuading them (357a–b), and between seeming good and being so (361b). The contrast recurs later in the dialogue: to take one notable example among several, Socrates says that while everyone is content with what seems just or fine even if it is not really so, Obtaining seeming [ta dokounta] goods satisfies no one, but they seek the real ones [ta onta], and here everyone disdains the seeming [doxa]. (Republic 505d)

In all these cases, Plato appeals to variations on doxa and dokein to express that something can seem to be some way whether or not it really is: not all 14  δοκέοντα γὰρ ὁ δοκιμώτατος γινώσκει, φυλάσσει. 15  τὸ δοκεῖν καὶ τὰν ἀλάθειαν βιᾶται. 16  As emphasized by Vogt (2012).

Being-seemed-to  149 seeming friends are real friends, not all seemingly just people are really just. Moreover, Plato’s pessimism in the Republic often implies the stronger thesis we see in Simonides and others: things tend to seem quite different from how they really are. The contrast between seeming and being is pervasive in other dialogues too. There are far too many instances to list here, but to take a few representative examples, consider the Apology’s discussion of those who seem or are reputed to be wise, but are not (21c), the Gorgias’ contrast between the seeming good condition of body or soul and the real thing (464a), the Theaetetus’ distinction between seeming and real advantage (172b), or the Sophist’s claim that false images are a matter of “appearing and seeming but not being”17 (236e). Plato thus joins his predecessors and contemporaries in making prom­in­ ent use of a robust notion of seeming on which what seems is sharply contrasted with what really is.

3. Being-seemed-to Plato also joins his predecessors and contemporaries in making prominent use of a corresponding notion of doxa as the subjective correlate of what seems: a use on which doxai are reactions to how things seem by contrast with how they are. If your attention is confined to what seems—if you are attending to reputations, façades, images, or appearances—you will as a result have doxa rather than epistêmê. To put it another way: subject-doxa is contrasted with epistêmê just as object-doxa is contrasted with being or truth, and the two contrasts run in parallel. This correlation is manifest in Gorgias’ Helen, where orators make “what is incredible and unclear appear [phainesthai] to the eyes of doxa” (Helen 13, cf. 10): appearances in the world are received on the subject’s end by doxa. In his Palamedes, knowledge is of truth, while subject-doxa in the subjective sense is of doxa in the object-sense, what seems: You have trust in doxa . . . not knowing the truth….But you should not trust those who have doxa but instead those who know, nor should you

17  τὸ γὰρ φαίνεσθαι τοῦτο καὶ τὸ δοκεῖν, εἶναι δὲ μή.

150  Doxa Is of What Seems consider doxa more trustworthy than truth, but the opposite – the truth more than doxa. (Palamedes 24)18

(In the contrast between doxa and knowing, the verb rendered as “have doxa” is doxazein, usually translated “to opine”; here the sense is clearly subjective. In the last line, where doxa is contrasted with truth, Gorgias more plausibly has in mind its object sense: how things seem rather than how they truly are.) We see something similar in Xenophanes’ exhortation to “have doxa of these things as resembling the true things” (Xenophanes B35). The “true things” are the object of a higher cognitive condition (see the variants on the verb eidenai in B34, quoted above); the things that merely resemble them are the object instead of doxa. The implication again is that subject-doxa is of what seems, by contrast with reality.19 The correlation persists after Plato’s time. In the commentary on Aristotle’s de Anima attributed to Simplicius, the author refers to a use of doxa to mean “cognition in accordance with the superficial and seeming” (ps-Simplic. in De Anima 309.35–6).20 The correlation is very explicit in a Stoic text: We say that the wise person’s not having doxa [mê doxazein] is ac­com­pan­ied by such characteristics as, first of all, nothing seeming [dokein] to them so-and-so; for such ‘seeming’ [dokêsis] is non-kataleptic doxa . . . (Anonymous Stoic treatise, (Herculaneum papyrus 1020, col. 4, col. 1= SVF 2.131, part; translation based on Long and Sedley 1987).

Someone with no doxai is not subject to how things seem. The Stoics of course do not mean that things in no way strike the wise person; the claim is that things do not seem in the special way that constitutes doxa’s objective correlate. 18  δόξῃ πιστεύσας . . . τὴν ἀλήθειαν οὐκ εἰδώς . . . ἀλλ’ οὔτε τοῖς δοξάζουσι δεῖ πιστεύειν ἀλλὰ τοῖς εἰδόσιν, οὔτε τὴν δόξαν τῆς ἀληθείας πιστοτέραν νομίζειν, ἀλλὰ τἀναντία τὴν ἀλήθειαν τῆς δόξης. I am translating the variants on eidenai here as “knowledge”; it is a worthwhile project, but one I leave for another occasion, to ask how they relate to Plato’s conception of epistêmê. 19  In the other passage we saw from Xenophanes (B34), it is not clear whether he intends dokos to have a subject sense or an object one, or perhaps to leave it indeterminate; in any case, truth (object) and knowledge (cognitive condition) stand on one side of a divide, while seeming stands on the other. 20  τὴν κατὰ τὸ ἐπιπόλαῖον καὶ δοκοῦν γνῶσιν. The author contrasts this with another use, taking this to be the one intended by Aristotle in the passage to which this is a commentary (De Anima 434a–10–12), which denies doxa to non-rational animals.

Being-seemed-to  151 Turning back to Plato, we find ample evidence of the correlation between subject- and object-doxa.21 It comes out particularly clearly in his discussion of rhetoric and sophistry, arts that he characterizes as both (a) concerned with what seems rather than what is, and (b) producing doxa rather than epistêmê.22 Consider especially two passages which move without argument between the two characterizations: [Phaedrus]: It’s necessary for the person who intends to be an orator to learn (a) not what is really [tôi onti] just but what seems so [ta doxant’] to the many who will pass judgment, nor what is really [ontôs] good or fine but which things will seem so [doxei]. For persuasion is [produced] from these things, and not from the truth. . . – [Socrates]: The orator, not knowing good and bad, undertakes to persuade a city in the same condition . . . about the bad, that it is good, and (b) having studied the doxai of the many, persuades them to do bad things instead of good ones. . . (Phaedrus 260a–c)23 [The sophist can] bewitch people who are young and standing still further from the truth of things, showing them spoken images about everything, (a) so as to make the things spoken seem true, and the speaker [seem] to be the wisest of all about everything…[But when later the students] grasp clearly the things that are, they will (b) change their former doxai. (Sophist 234c–d)

Plato takes the claim that (a) the orator or sophist presents what seems just (or good or fine) to entail the claim that (b) the orator is concerned with the audience’s doxai. He takes the claim that (a) the sophist makes things seem true and makes himself seem wise to entail the claim that (b) he has in so doing produced doxai in the audience. Evidently Plato does not sharply distinguish between studying how things seem to people and studying their

21  Cornford argues that Plato is following Parmenides in this, citing his use of dokein and also phainesthai in the first section of the Theaetetus and in Republic V (1933, 101; cf. Palmer 1999). 22  In addition to the passages quoted below, for claim (a) see among others Gorgias 464a–b (rhetoric makes the soul seem to be in good condition rather than to be so; Sophist 233c, Republic 602b, and Gorgias 459b–c: “there is no need for the orator to know the things themselves, how they are [αὐτὰ μὲν τὰ πράγματα οὐδὲν δεῖ αὐτὴν εἰδέναι ὅπως ἔχει], for he has discovered a mechanism of persuasion which makes him appear [φαίνεσθαι] to non-knowers to more than the knowers.” For claim (b), see also Theaetetus 201a, discussed in Chapter 10. 23 Phaedrus speaks the first part of this passage; Socrates disagrees with the advice to or­ators, but agrees that this is how things are done at present.

152  Doxa Is of What Seems doxai; he does not sharply distinguish between influencing how things seem to people and giving them new doxai. I suggest that he is taking it as obvious that a subject-doxa is the result of accepting how things seem, where that is sharply contrasted with how things are. Consider also two comments he makes in the continuation of the discussion in the Phaedrus: In political speaking [the orator] will make the same things seem [dokein] to the city at some times good and at other times in turn the opposite. (Phaedrus 261d) [The orator is one who] does not know the truth, but hunts down doxai. (Phaedrus 262c)

In the first passage should we translate “he makes the same things seem good and bad to the city,” or “he makes the city have the [subject-] doxa that the same things good and bad”? In the second should we translate “hunts down how things seem,” or “hunts down [subject-] doxai”? I submit that there is no fact of the matter here. The claims are fundamentally ambiguous, for to make x seem F to S is at the same time to give S the subject-doxa that x is F. We find a similar move with the same implication in a very different context. In Republic VII, in describing the philosophical investigation that will lead to epistêmê of the Good, Plato strongly implies that this method yields epistêmê because it attends to being, while alternatives leave us with doxa because they attend instead to seeming: Whoever is not able to define the Form of the Good by logos. . . (a) being zealous to examine it not in accordance with doxa but in accordance with Being 24 . . . you will say that the person like that does not know [eidenai] the Good itself nor any other good. But if he should in a way lay hold of some image, you will say (b) he lays hold of it by doxa, not epistêmê, and spends this present life dreaming and sleeping.  (Republic 534b–c, emphases mine)

In Chapter  7 I will discuss how to understand the idea of investigating Forms in accordance with being as opposed to seeming, but for now we can note the pattern. In its first occurrence (in (a)) doxa is contrasted with being (ousia), and so we should take it in the object sense, how things seem: we

24  μὴ κατὰ δόξαν ἀλλὰ κατ’ οὐσίαν.

The Basic Conception of doxa  153 can follow Adam’s translation of the italicized portion as “striving to test his view not by that which seems, but by that which is.” In its second occurrence (in (b)) the contrast is instead with epistêmê, so we now have doxa in the subject sense, being-seemed-to. Investigating things in accordance with what seems rather than with being gives one doxa rather than epistêmê; a focus on seemings in the world produces being-seemed-to in the mind. These unargued moves from claims of type (a) to claims of type (b) suggest that Plato is working with an implicit theory of doxa by contrast with epistêmê as a response to what seems by contrast with reality. I want to draw out two implications of this. First, we can add another contrast to Chapter 3’s list, one that again correlates the ontologically superior with epistêmê and the ontologically in­fer­ ior with doxa: (Contrast 5):  What Is versus what seems. (In the passage from the Republic, Plato is contrasting Forms and perceptibles; in the passages on rhetoric, he is instead contrasting perceptibles as they are and as they appear. Nonetheless both contexts distinguish something ontologically superior from something ontologically inferior—although in the second context the superiority is only relative. See Chapter 7.1 for related discussion.) The other implication is that while Plato correlates doxa with various items, or with things under various descriptions, as we saw in Contrasts 1– 4 (where epistêmê is correlated with Being and doxa with the in-between, or Becoming, or the many Fs, or images), the correlation with doxa in this particular contrast is special. The etymological connection, and the unargued moves between claims about object- and subject-doxa, all suggest that Plato takes “Doxa is of what seems” to be as obvious and uncontroversial as “Epistêmê is of what is.”

4.  The Basic Conception of doxa This finding, together with the evidence that Plato’s epistemology is objectsbased, suggests a hypothesis: just as the defining object of epistêmê is Being, the defining object of doxa is seeming. Plato inflates the linguistic association between doxa and dokein into a substantive theory on which doxa is, in its essence, cognition of what seems.

154  Doxa Is of What Seems In the next chapter, I show that this hypothesis is borne out. The i­n­ter­pret­ation can do the work we want from a Basic Conception: it can explain Plato’s characterizations of doxa. Moreover, although Plato often characterizes doxa’s object in other ways—as “what is between being and not-being,” in the powers argument, or as perceptibles, or Becoming—all these turn out to be unified under the category of seeming. In Chapter  8 I  will turn to the question of how we should understand doxa on this interpretation.

7

The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work On an objects-based epistemology, each cognitive kind is the way it is because it is that by which we cognize a certain kind of object; all its features are explained by this relation. If doxa’s defining object is what seems, we should be able to appeal to that fact in order to see why Plato attributes to doxa all the features that he does. In this chapter I aim to show that this expectation is borne out. As with epistêmê, my focus is on Plato’s characterization of doxa in the Two Worlds dialogues, and I devote the most attention to the most mysterious facet of doxa by modern lights: the Two Worlds dialogues’ implication that there is no doxa of Forms. I consider doxa in the earlier and later ­dialogues in Chapters 9 and 10.

1.  Truth and falsity As we saw in Chapter 4.1, at times Plato says that only the objects we encounter through epistêmê are true, implying that in doxa we never attain the truth. Philosophers have epistêmê because they behold the truth; the people with doxa behold not the truth about Beauty, but only something inferior, sights and sounds (Republic 475e, quoted in 4.1); epistêmê belongs to those who behold things “true and divine and not the objects of doxa (adoxaston)” (Phaedo 84a). At other points, however, Plato says that doxa can be true. The Two Worlds dialogues pay less attention to the distinction between true and false doxa than the Meno or Theaetetus, but even here it is important: false doxai about important things are dangerous and must be eradicated; in some ­contexts at least, true doxai are valuable and should be pursued. (See for ex­ample Plato’s characterization of the educational program as instilling and preserving true doxai in the young (Republic 412e–413a).) Plato’s Epistemology: Being and Seeming. Jessica Moss, Oxford University Press (2021). © Jessica Moss. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198867401.003.0008

156  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work Notably, this ambiguity about doxa’s relation to truth tracks an ambiguity about doxa’s relation to being. We have seen plenty of evidence that doxa is of the ontologically inferior by contrast with Being; when Plato speaks of true doxa, however, he also speaks of doxa as having access to being. We see this in his definition of true doxa in the Sophist: true doxa, as the inner ­analogue of true logos, “states the things that are as they are” (legei . . . ta onta hôs estin, Sophist 263b with 263e–264a). A similar claim makes a brief appearance in the Republic, the very dialogue which makes the most explicit claims to the effect that doxa is not of Being: to get truth (alêtheuein) is to have doxa of the things that are (ta onta doxazein, 413a; see also Symposium 202a, where true doxa hits on what is (tou ontos tunchanon)). We can resolve the ambiguity if we assume that in the contexts where he speaks of true doxa, or of doxa of what is, Plato is not using ‘truth’ and ‘being’ with their special function of marking ontological superiority, but instead only in one or another of the ordinary senses canvassed in ­Chapter 3: what exists, what is the case, what is F for some property.1 In these contexts, Plato will say that some doxai are of what is, namely the doxai that accurately capture ordinary facts. Given the conceptual link between being and truth (see Chapter 4.1), he will therefore also grant these doxai the title ‘true.’ Our Basic Conception dictates a clear explanation for this fluctuation. There are better and worse seemings, and correspondingly better and worse doxai. A just person may veridically seem to be just or deceptively seem to be unjust (Republic 365b); some images accurately reproduce the proportions of the originals, while others distort them (Sophist 235d–236c). Nonetheless, the line between seemings as a whole and Being is much brighter than that between different kinds of seeming. Seeming is never identical with Being, and so never touches the unqualified truth. The Basic Conception predicts that when Plato is most focused on the inferiority of seeming, he will be least inclined to speak of true doxa, and that prediction is borne out. In the Two Worlds dialogues, as I will argue below, doxa is of Becoming, and there is no truth or Being in the realm of Becoming; it is no surprise then that the Republic’s elaborate epis­temo­ logic­al classifications in the Line and Cave discussions never mention the difference between true and false doxa, but instead oppose doxa without qualification to higher conditions. Indeed, it is not difficult to see how 1  For example, after defining true doxa as being of what is, the Theaetetus identifies “the things that are” as “the things that come through the senses” (Theaetetus 194d).

Inferiority  157 someone could interpret Plato as entirely rejecting the notion of true doxa, as indeed some of his Ancient interpreters did: Plato held that the whole criterion of truth and truth itself was removed from opinions [viz., doxai] and from the senses, and belonged to thought itself and the mind.  (Cicero Academica II.142, emphasis added)2

The Republic does introduce what looks to be a different way of distinguishing between better and worse doxai: it identifies two species of doxa, pistis (trust or conviction) and eikasia (imagination, conjecture). Corresponding to these are two levels of ontology which are, I will argue below, both things that seem. One is further from Being and the other closer, but both only seem, and thus both are the objects not of epistêmê but of doxa.3

2. Inferiority Unlike contemporary epistemology’s belief, in the sense of generic judgment, doxa in the Two Worlds dialogues—and indeed throughout most of Plato’s works—is an inferior condition.4 This is one of the features that distinguishes it from contemporary belief: belief is a generic phenomenon with inferior kinds, like opinion, and superior kinds, like knowledge; thus to acquire a superior grasp of something is not to lose one’s beliefs, but instead to improve them. According to the Two Worlds dialogues, on the other hand, to acquire epistêmê is to leave doxa behind.5 (In this way doxa is akin to the contemporary folk notion of opinion. For connections between doxa and opinion see Chapter 8.4.) The Basic Conception explains this neatly: once someone grasps how things are, they have no need to rest content with how things seem. This is a truism, independent of substantive metaphysical

2  omne iudicium veritatis veritatemque ipsam abductam ab opinionibus et a sensibus cogitationis ipsius et mentis esse voluit. ‘Opinio’ is the standard Latin translation of ‘doxa.’ 3  Plato does say that the objects of pistis are more true than those of eikasia, and we can infer that a doxa based on acquaintance with a just person (for example) is truer than a doxa based on acquaintance with a poetic representation of a just person; nonetheless, even the former does not get at the real truth. I return to this subject below. 4  Compare Vogt 2012. 5  As symbolized by the distinction between the lower sections of the Line as species of doxa and the higher sections as something else, or by the inside of the Cave as the realm of doxa (doxaston) and the outside as something else.

158  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work views about being and seeming; below I will show how Plato inflates this truism to yield the Distinct Objects view. At certain points in some later dialogues—especially the Theaetetus— Plato does seem to treat doxa as generic belief, with epistêmê as a special kind of doxa. Arguably here Plato’s use of ‘doxa’ simply changes. I discuss this development in Chapter 10, arguing that even here we can see the Basic Conception at work. In the rest of this book, however, I confine my attention to doxa as we see it in the Two Worlds dialogues (and, I will argue the earlier ones too): an inferior cognitive condition, opposed to epistêmê.

3. Instability A main feature of doxa emphasized throughout the dialogues is its instability. Someone with a true doxa may well lose that doxa in the face of temptation or fear (most explicit at Meno 97e–98a, but strongly implied at Republic 430a, where special measures must be taken to ensure that correct doxa will not be “washed out” by temptation or fear, and at Protagoras 356d–357a, where epistêmê is what ensures that we will not change our minds in the face of deceptive appearances), or through a process of persuasion (strongly implied at Gorgias 459a–c, where those who lack epistêmê are subject to persuasion; see also the Platonic Definitions, where doxa is defined as “open to persuasion [metapeistos] by logos,” by contrast with epistêmê (414b–c). This feature is easily explained by the Basic Conception, for Plato clearly holds that appearances are shifty. They change depending on the circumstance, the perspective, the subject’s position in space relative to an object, or in time relative to an event (Republic 598a, 602c, Phaedo 74b, Protagoras 356d–e). Thoughts based on how things seem will thus predictably change—by sharp contrast with thoughts based on how things are. This is obviously an instance of the doctrine of like-by-like, joined with the Basic Conception: cognition of unstable objects (seemings) is itself unstable. In Section 5 we will see more evidence for this explanation of doxa’s instability, along with its other messy features: its unclarity and imprecision.

4. Persuasion In several dialogues, Plato characterizes doxa as the product of rhetorical persuasion, by contrast with teaching:

Persuasion  159 Nous and true doxa . . . must be said to be two different kinds, because they come to be separately and are unlike. The former one arises in us through teaching, the latter through persuasion [peithous] . . . And the former is unmovable by persuasion, the later we can be persuaded to change [metapeiston]. (Timaeus 51d–e; cf. Gorgias 454e) Orators and lawyers. . . persuade, using their craft, not teaching but making people have doxa of [doxazein] whatever they wish them to. (Theaetetus 201a) Indeed Plato seems even to define persuasion as the producing of doxa: Don’t you mean by ‘persuading someone’ making them form a doxa?6 (Theaetetus 201b)

The connection between teaching and epistêmê looks quasi-definitional, here and at other points in the corpus: a process only counts as teaching if it results in epistêmê. But why should persuasion produce only doxa? Plato’s texts suggest several simple pragmatic explanations. There is no time to do better: imparting epistêmê is a lengthy procedure, which the orator under the clock cannot undertake (Theaetetus 201a–b, Gorgias 455a).7 There is no need to do better: the orator is concerned to influence people rather than to promote truth (Phaedrus 260a). But these are contingent restrictions: an orator with sufficient time, and noble motivations, could overcome them. Plato seems to view the tie between rhetoric and doxa as something stronger—as if there were something in the nature of rhetorical persuasion, or something in the nature of doxa, that explains it. Persuading just is producing doxa (Theaetetus 201a); doxa is the kind of thing that arises from persuasion (Timaeus 51d). Our Basic Conception of doxa provides a simple explanation of this tie, and one that has ample support in Plato’s texts. Doxa is of what seems; rhetoric trades in seemings rather than reality; therefore rhetoric produces doxa.

6  τὸ πεῖσαι δ’ οὐχὶ δοξάσαι λέγεις ποιῆσαι. 7  In the lines immediately following those quoted above: “Or do you think that there are any teachers so clever that they could within the short time allowed by the clock adequately teach people who were not present [not eye-witnesses] the truth . . . - Definitely not, but they could persuade them” (Theaetetus 201a–b). Compare Gorgias 455a: “surely he wouldn’t be able to teach so many people in such a short time such important affairs”.

160  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work We have already seen evidence that Plato presents rhetoric as exploiting how things seem and as a result producing doxa in its audience, in ­Chapter 6. In the Phaedrus Plato says both that (a) the orator presents what seems good, just, healthy, wise, with indifference to the question of whether or not these things really are such as they seem, and that (b) the audience comes away with doxa rather than epistêmê about such things (Phaedrus 260a–c). In the Sophist, he makes the same two claims about an art that he elsewhere describes as almost indistinguishable from rhetoric (Gorgias 465c), namely sophistry (Sophist 234c–d). The sophist produces and exploits mere seemings by contrast with realities: he is able to “produce a seeming [doxan paraskeuazein]8 as of being the wisest of anyone about everything,” although he is not (233b); he makes his words seem (dokein) true whether or not they are (234c). Indeed, the sophist’s false appearances are sharply contrasted with the things that are, or realities (ta onta): [But when later the students] approach close to the things that are [tois te ousi] and are forced by their experiences to grasp clearly the things that are, they will change their former doxai, so that . . . the phantoms in [the sophists’] speeches are totally overturned . . .  (Sophist 234d–e).9

Thus the sophist produces seemings rather than beings. And the result in the audience is doxa: this is explicit at 234d (the false appearances instill doxai in the audience, which the realities will dispel), and strongly implied throughout, since it is clear both that the sophist influences his audience’s thoughts and that he does not give them epistêmê. Thus the Basic Conception explains why rhetoric produces only doxa: rhetoric’s whole power consists in presenting what seems by contrast with what is, and attending to what seems yields doxa.

8  Here we could interpret ‘doxa’ in either the object or subject sense. 9  The realm of what seems is here sharply separated from the realm of Beings. This is even clearer after the dialogue’s long discussion of Being and not-being: “The sophist runs off into the darkness of that which is not, which he’s had practice dealing with [viz, because he deals in false seemings] . . .but the philosopher always uses reasoning to stay near the Form of Being. He isn’t at all easy to see because that area is so bright and the eyes of most people’s souls can’t bear to look at what’s divine” (Sophist 254a–b, trans. White). The sophist operates in the realm of what seems but is not; the realm of Being is the domain instead of the philosopher—that is, it is the separate realm of Forms.

Restriction to perceptibles  161

5.  Restriction to perceptibles In the Two Worlds dialogues, as we have seen at length in Chapters 1 and 3, Plato consistently correlates doxa with the ontologically inferior realm—the realm which he contrasts with Being, and which he describes variously as Becoming, as what is between Being and not-being, and as the perceptible. Doxa is set over what is between Being and not-being (Republic 478e); it is about (peri) becoming (Republic 534a), or becoming is its object (doxaston, Timaeus 28a); doxa grasps the perceptible realm (aisthêton, Timaeus 37b, 52a; cf. the Republic’s casual equation of the doxaston, object of doxa, with the horaton, visible (see 509d with 510a). What Is, meanwhile is grasped by epistêmê, by sharp contrast with doxa (in all the passages just listed); indeed Being is adoxaston (Phaedo 84a). Moreover, as I argued in Chapter 2, this correlation is by no means contingent: Plato’s like-by-like account of cognition renders it necessary. Doxa is a messy form of cognition: unstable, unclear, imprecise.10 It is thereby suited to grasp only messy things. On the metaphysics of the Two Worlds dialogues, this restricts it to the ontologically inferior realm of perceptible objects and their images, for these are messy, and Being clean.11 Doxa is thus by its very nature restricted to the ontologically inferior realm. A good account of doxa must explain these features. Why is it specially associated with the ontologically inferior? Why is it specially associated with perception? And why is it not merely associated with the inferior realm but confined to it, unable to grasp Being? These questions pose particularly sharp problems for the view that doxa is belief, in the sense either of generic judgment or ordinary opinion. These are in no way specially connected with perception and the perceptible, nor with anything ontologically inferior. Indeed, they can be about anything. This makes the Distinct Objects view particularly mysterious when it comes to doxa. Epistêmê is plausibly restricted in its objects precisely because it is such a demanding mental state; belief, by contrast, is cheap! If you have even just only heard of quarks, or Persians, or the factors of 8,000, you can have beliefs about them—ill-founded, to be sure, and perhaps mostly false, 10  Meno 98a, Protagoras 356d–e, Republic 484b, 511a, Philebus 57b–d, 59d. 11  Like the many beautiful things, all things that come to be and pass away are unstable, unclear, changing, contradictory; what Is, meanwhile, is stable, clear, precise, always the same in every way (Republic 479a–b, Phaedo 74b–c, 78d–e, Symposium 210e–211b, Philebus 59a–b, Timaeus 52a).

162  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work but beliefs nonetheless. How then could Plato insist that doxa is about the ontologically inferior realm alone; how could he deny doxa of Forms? I think this explains the insistence, even among some who accept that epistêmê is restricted to Forms, that doxa cannot be restricted to per­cep­ tibles (Vogt 2012, Schwab 2016).12 On the Basic Conception of doxa as cognition of what seems, there is an excellent rationale for the restriction. It is a tenet of Two Worlds metaphysics, I will argue, that what seems is the ontologically inferior perceptible realm of Becoming, and that alone. Becoming seems, and so we have doxa of it; Being does not seem, and so we have no doxa of it. These claims are in a way simple and unsurprising. I am arguing that Plato construes the perceptible realm as a realm of mere appearance, and the realm of Forms as hidden, non-apparent. Plato is widely taken to hold this kind of view; to regard the perceptible realm as a “veil of appearance” obscuring the truth, as Nietzsche puts it.13 I take the time to defend the view carefully because although it is often attributed to Plato it is rarely explicit in his texts (I can find only two outright claims that perceptible realm is a seeming or appearance: it is “the region that appears [phainomenên] through sight” at Republic 517b; it is a phantasma, deceptive appearance, at Timaeus 52c). Moreover, spelling out and defending the view will require some precision. That is my project in the remainder of the chapter. In carrying it out, I appeal to the theory of seeming that I argued is implicit in Plato and his predecessors, defended in Chapter 6.2. On this theory, to say that x seems means that (1) x strikes us vividly and manifestly as being certain ways, but (2) this does not entail anything about how things really are. In what follows I will argue that the realm of Becoming, as Plato characterizes it in the Two Worlds dialogues, meets both criteria very well, while the realm of Being fits neither.

5a.  Becoming is not what Is When Plato distinguishes a realm of Being from something inferior, the inferior realm is a fortiori not the realm of Being. It is “between Being and 12  See the quotations in Chapter 1.1. from Annas 1981, 194, Fine 1990, 85, Vogt 2012, 51, and Harte  2018, 142. For a more detailed argument that the interpretation of doxa as belief mo­tiv­ates resistance to the Distinct Objects reading, see Moss 2020. 13  Daybreak, Section 474. Compare among others Cornford  1941 at 180: the perceptible realm is a “world of mere appearances.”

Restriction to perceptibles  163 not-being” (Republic 478e), it is not completely Being (teleôs de einai on,  Republic 597a), it becomes rather than Is (Republic 534a, Timaeus 27d–28a). Correspondingly (given the link between Being and truth which we saw in Chapter 4.1), it is devoid of truth: the soul should “suppose nothing true that it investigates through [the senses]” (Phaedo 83b), which is to say that there is no truth in the perceptible realm; it is on the Forms by contrast with perceptibles that “truth and what Is shine” (Republic 508d); perceptible things “partake less in truth and being” than intelligibles (Republic 585d). In every context in which Plato uses ‘Being’ or ‘truth’ to mark the superiority of the one realm, he refuses those labels to the other. The realm of Becoming—the ordinary, perceptible realm of the many beautifuls, bigs, smalls, and so on—is not what Is; it is not the realm of ­ultimate reality. That Plato relegates the perceptible realm of Becoming to an onto­logic­ al­ly inferior status should be uncontroversial; there is however plenty of controversy about how to interpret the view. This tracks the debates about how to interpret Being reviewed in Chapter 3.3: in saying that perceptibles fall short of Being, is Plato saying that they lack essences? That they have their properties only in some deficient way, e.g. temporarily or impurely? That they are copies rather than originals?14 Following my strategy in ­Chapter 3, I will remain neutral between these interpretations, for again the point I wish to emphasize is very general. I want simply to emphasize that  where Plato contrasts a superior intelligible realm with an inferior ­perceptible one, he uses ‘Being’ to pick out the intelligible realm, and by contrast relegates the perceptible realm to an ontologically inferior status. The perceptible realm is not what Is—not what is ultimately real. This gets expressed in the central metaphor of Plato’s Two Worlds ­metaphysics: the entire perceptible realm of Becoming is a mere image of the Forms. Not only the shadows on the wall but also the puppets that cast them—that is, all perceptible things—are images of the things outside the Cave (eidôla, 516a). Beautiful particulars are images of Beauty (Phaedrus 250d); they are likenesses of the Form as dream-images are likeness of their originals (Rep 476c); the whole perceptible realm is related to the intelligible realm “as the likeness is to what it is like” (Republic 510a); Being is the 14  For example: Plato means that beautiful perceptibles cannot be necessarily, but only contingently beautiful Vlastos 1981), or cannot be essentially, but only accidentally, beautiful (Nehamas 1975), or that they are in some sense are beautiful, but not in the primary sense, just as an image of X is in some sense X but not in the primary sense in which X alone is X (Allen 1960).

164  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work model (paradeigma, Timaeus 28a), Becoming the copy (eikôn, Timaeus 29b) or imitation (mimêma, Timaeus 50c); even in an ideal city the characters and customs are mere images of the Forms, as if painted on their model (Republic 500e–501c). If the perceptible world is an image of the real world, then the perceptible realm is not itself real: images are contrasted with “what really is” (to ontôs on, Timaeus 52c, Sophist 240b); perceptible copies of Forms are mere phantoms of them (phantasmata, Timaeus 52c). Plato is indeed also interested in a distinction between original and image within the perceptible realm—between for example a tree and its shadow, or the genuine justice of a good person and the apparent justice of a scoundrel with a good reputation. This is the distinction between the two parts of the lower section of the Line, symbolized by the distinction between puppets and their shadows in the Cave, and revisited in Republic X’s distinctions between the carpenter’s bed and the painter’s, or the lawmaker’s virtue and the poet’s (Republic 598a, 599d–600e).15 These distinctions are im­port­ ant to Plato. Nonetheless, as the Line and Cave make particularly clear, he regards even perceptible originals as, ultimately, mere images of something higher. One section of Becoming is a more direct image of the Forms than its shadows and copies, but it is an image nonetheless, not the reality. One section of Becoming is closer to Being, but it is still not what Is. One remark on this point: the famous summoners passage (Republic 523a–524d), which we will discuss below, is sometimes thought to show that there is some ontological perfection in the perceptible realm, alongside the imperfection—some being and truth. Here Plato argues that while perception gives us confused reports about qualities like the Big and Small, reporting on such matters deficiently (523e) it reports adequately that something is a finger (523b).16 Does this passage say that perception gives us the truth about fingers? Fine argues that it does—and therefore that we have epistêmê of perceptibles (1990); others may infer at least that there is truth available to perception, and thereby to doxa. But the passage does not say that ­perception reveals the truth or being of a finger. Its point instead is that perceiving a finger as a finger is unproblematic; such perception does

15  The carpenter makes a bed that is a copy of the Form, the painter a bed that is a copy of that copy. Likewise the (good) lawmaker produces a character in the citizens that is a copy of the Form of Virtue, while the poet’s characters exhibit a copy of that copy. 16  “Some things in perception do not summon the intellect to investigate, since they are discerned adequately by the sense [ὡς ἱκανῶς ὑπὸ τῆς αἰσθήσεως κρινόμενα], while others in every way call on intellect to investigate, since the sense produces nothing sound [ὑγιές]” (523a–b).

Restriction to perceptibles  165 not produce confusions that lead us to “summon reasoning and thought.” Perception of a finger as big or small, by contrast, can lead us to do such summoning; when this happens, “it first occurs to us to ask what at all the Big is, and the Small” (524c). Hence the claim about perception is not that it puts us in touch with the Being of fingers, but instead that it does not raise questions about that Being. Perhaps Plato thinks that there is no Being of fingers, no deep truth to be found by looking beyond perception: a finger is just a bundle of seeming bigness, seeming smallness, seeming hardness, and so on. Alternately, perhaps he thinks there is a deep truth about fingers, but if so then this, just like the truth about beauty and bigness and the rest, would reside in an imperceptible Form, not in a perceptible image. (If there is a Form of Finger, it is not the kind of Form whose instances are particularly contradictory, and therefore good at summoning thought, and that is why he does not dwell on it here.) I do not know which of these views to ­attribute to him. In either case, however, the passage in no way conflicts with what we see so clearly throughout the Two Worlds dialogues: the per­ cep­tible world is devoid of ultimate Being and Truth.

5b.  Becoming seems to be Although the realm of Becoming is not what really Is, neither is it nothing at all. It is something else: seeming. We can find a semi-technical argument for this view in Plato’s texts. The Republic’s powers argument identifies the object of doxa as what is between Being and not-being, by contrast with what in every way is (478d–e). This odd characterization is echoed in the Sophist’s contrast between “what really is [to ontôs on],” and deceptive images which as “are in some way [pôs], but not truly” (240b). An image is not what it purports to be, but it is something. What is it then? In various places Plato’s answer is clear: a seeming, an appearance. The imitative artist makes “things that appear, but are not in truth”17 (Republic 596e); a deceptive sophist is in the business of “appearing and seeming but not being”18 (Sophist 236e). When we attend to an image— such as the entire perceptible realm—we do not access what really is, but neither are we in touch with nothing. Instead, we are in touch with what

17  φαινόμενα, οὐ μέντοι ὄντα γέ που τῇ ἀληθείᾳ. 18  τὸ γὰρ φαίνεσθαι τοῦτο καὶ τὸ δοκεῖν, εἶναι δὲ μή.

166  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work Republic V calls “what is between being and not-being,” and what these other passages portray as what seems to be. We can also find a more intuitive although less explicit argument that the perceptible realm is a realm of seeming. It strikes us as being what there is, all there is; without the active intellectual labor of questioning and resisting and transcending how things seem, we are doomed to accept it as ultimate reality. To use Plato’s analogies, it is like a dream-image that seems to be the original (Republic 476c), or a shadow that seems to be an ordinary material object (Republic 515a–c), or a cave that seems to be the whole world. We are easily deceived into taking it for more than what it is. Indeed, that is our default stance, one we must be educated into transcending, like prisoners being led out of the Cave. One might stop here to wonder just how to interpret this notion of “seeming real.” Does the perceptible realm seem to be the very thing that is in fact real, namely the Forms, the way that a dream-image of one’s mother seems to be the very person of which it is an image, one’s mother? This would give Plato a very implausible view of folk ontology, and indeed one that contradicts his explicit claims. The sight-lovers do not acknowledge that there is any such thing as the Form of Beauty (476b–c, 479a): in mistaking beautiful sights and sounds for “that thing itself which they resemble” (476c), therefore, they cannot be thinking “These are the Form.” Instead they must be thinking something like: this is all there is, this is the ultimate, this is what there is to know about beauty. This interpretation gives us a plausible understanding of the Cave prisoners’ world-view, too. It is not that they appreciate the difference between shadows and reality while misidentifying the shadows as realities, as someone might be tricked into taking a reflection for reality in a hall of mirrors. Instead, they simply think “This is what there is.” (As strongly implied by Plato’s description: “Do you suppose they would have seen anything other than the shadows . . . ? . . . . Therefore in every way such people would consider [nomizoien] the truth to be nothing other than the shadows of the puppets” (515a–c).) Or perhaps they have no ontological thoughts at all, so that the shadows’ seeming real to them is just a matter of their failing to notice that there are any questions to be asked about their reality. Although the letter of Plato’s words at 515a–c may suggest that the prisoners have a substantive ontological theory, one of these quietist interpretations is more charitable. In any case, we can ask why Becoming strikes us this way—why it is so easy to take Becoming for reality, and so hard to recognize it as a mere

Restriction to perceptibles  167 image. Consider the shadows in the Cave, which so thoroughly strike the prisoners as real that even when they turn to see the puppets they think the shadows “more true” (alêthestera, 515d). Plato does not say why the ­shadows have this effect on the prisoners, but presumably it is because they are simply given: familiar, readily present, manifest to the prisoners without any effort on their part. The shadows foist themselves on the prisoners’ attention, inviting their trust; in the absence of any motive for doubt, the prisoners take them at face value, not as derivative copies of something higher but simply as what there is. Plato adds that the prisoners are fastened into place by “chains of kinship with becoming,” attached to them by “feasts and that sort of pleasures and luxuries” (519a–b). What keeps them from looking away from the shadows—from doubting their reality and searching for something better—is thus not only the inescapable presence of the shadows, but also some gratification they provide.19 Likewise, the entire realm of Becoming foists itself on our attention and invites our trust, because it is what we are given, and because it gratifies us. In particular, it presents itself to us through perception. In the Republic the realm of Becoming is described interchangeably as the object of doxa ­(doxaston, 510a) and as the visible (horaton, 509d); in the Timaeus Becoming “is the object of doxa [doxaston] through doxa with unreasoned perception” (Timaeus 28a; cf. 52a); in the Phaedo, whenever the soul investigates “either through seeing or through hearing or through some other sense . . . it is dragged by the body toward the things that are never the same”—that is, toward Becoming (Phaedo 79c). The realm of Becoming is what we access through our senses. And Plato clearly thinks that our default human tendency is to accept as real what we perceive. All the many beautiful things, big things, and so on are given to us through perception the way that ­shadows are to the Cave prisoners: familiar, readily present, manifest to us without effort on our part. Perceptibles lay claim to our attention and invite our trust; in the absence of any motive for doubt, we take them at face value as what there is.

19  This passage strongly suggests that the gratification is appetitive. Later it turns out that there is thumoetic gratification too: the prisoners get honors and praises for skill at predicting which shadow will appear next (Republic 516c–d). Plato does not explicitly say that this further binds the prisoners to the Cave, but that is a plausible inference: one has added incentive not to doubt the reality of a realm in which one is honored and admired.

168  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work This theme is particularly strong in the Phaedo’s characterizations of philosophy: The lovers of learning know that when philosophy gets hold of their soul, it is imprisoned in and glued to the body . . . . and that the most terrible thing about this prison is that it is due to appetites . . . Philosophy, taking hold of the soul in this state, gently encourages it and attempts to free it, showing that investigation through the eyes is full of deception, and investigation through the ears and the other senses too, and persuading it to hold back from these, insofar as it is not necessary to use them . . . and to trust [pisteuein] in nothing other than itself, because it can itself by itself think [noêsêi] the things that by themselves Are; and to suppose [hêgeisthai] nothing true that it investigates through other means, being different in different situations. For that kind of thing is perceptible and visible, while what [the soul] itself sees is intelligible and eternal . . .  (Phaedo 82d–83b)

It is part of the embodied human condition to think that what we perceive is what is real; only philosophical investigation can break that trust. Moreover, as with the Cave prisoners’ trust in shadows, this tendency is exacerbated by our appetites and passions. We should abstain from bodily pleasures and pains, the passage continues, because: The soul of every person when it is strongly pleased or pained by something is forced also to think that the thing that causes the experience is most clear and most true; but this is not so. And these are most of all vis­ ible things . . . Every pleasure and pain just like a nail fastens the soul to the body and rivets it and makes it corporeal, having doxa [doxazousan] that whatever things the body says are true are true. For from this having doxa in agreement with the body [homodoxein], and enjoying the same things, it becomes like the body in manner and nurture. . .  (Phaedo 83c–d)20

Thus the realm of Becoming strikes us as what there is, readily and manifestly, even though it is not. And on the theory of seeming I have defended

20  How do pleasure and pain make perceptibles seem more real? In the Cave allegory Plato’s thought seems to be that the pleasure we take in shadows motivates us not to doubt their reality. Here the thought is somewhat different: through pleasure and pain perceptibles affect us strongly, manifestly, and vividly; they demand our attention.

Restriction to perceptibles  169 (Chapter 6.2), this amounts to saying that, like a false friend or a false ­reputation for justice, Becoming is something that seems rather than Is. I have argued that Becoming seems real because it is readily present and manifest to us, particularly through perception. The argument so far risks simplification in two ways, however; addressing these is not only important in clarifying what it means for Becoming to seem, but will also help us see why Being does not seem.

5c.  Seeming and Perception First, the characterization of Becoming as perceptible must be interpreted with some caution. If we assume too narrow a notion of perception, we will exclude from the realm of Becoming many things that Plato clearly includes. Certainly when he identifies Becoming as the visible realm (Republic 509d), he has in mind more than the proper object of sight, color: he takes the realm of Becoming to include ordinary material objects, things that come into being and pass away and change (in Aristotle’s terminology, incidental objects of perception as well as proper or common ones). More puzzling for the modern reader, some of the things Plato puts in this realm we would not count as visible or otherwise perceptible at all. Cave prisoners “contend about the shadows of justice, or about the statues which cast them . . . never having seen Justice itself ” (517d–e): since the Cave symbolizes the realm of Becoming, we can conclude that this realm includes particular instances of justice or injustice, along with images of them (such as the portrayals of justice in poetry). Arguably we cannot literally see or hear the justice of a particular action or character, but Plato counts these as paradigm examples of Becoming. How then should we understand the characterization of Becoming as perceptible—and consequent on that, the relation between perception and what seems, and consequent on that, the relation between perception and doxa? I will not attempt to answer these questions in any detail here: a full answer would require a detailed study of Plato’s theory of perception; moreover I think that the Republic, by contrast with the later dialogues, leave these questions seriously underdetermined.21 I will instead briefly sketch two possible accounts, both consistent with my interpretation of seeming. 21  For some discussion of perception in the Republic see Burnyeat  1976 and Storey  2014. The Timaeus gives us ample resources to define perception narrowly, and while it does not offer

170  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work First, perhaps Plato construes perception so broadly that he counts even the justice of a just action as strictly perceptible. In this case, we may be hard pressed to find any difference between what it is for something to be perceptible and what it is for something to seem: perhaps we should understand being perceptible in the ways I have characterized seeming so far— being vivid, manifest, readily present—with narrowly sensory perceptibles as paradigm cases. If so, then we will also be hard pressed to find any difference between the subjective correlates of perceptibles and of what seems, namely perception and doxa. As in the theory Plato attributes to Protagoras in the first part of the Theaetetus, they will be equivalent.22 This may in fact be a plausible reading of the Republic, by contrast with later dialogues including the Timaeus, which do very clearly distinguish perception from doxa (see especially 77b). Perhaps in the Republic Plato thinks of perception as a broad category equivalent to seeming, with sensory perception as only one particular kind. Alternately, perhaps Plato construes perception fairly narrowly, even in the Republic, but nonetheless counts things like the justice of a just action as part of the perceptible realm. Here is a possible rationale: he construes the perceptible realm as the realm in which we are stuck so long as we trust perception to put us in touch with the real.23 What I mean by this will become clearer below when we consider the summoners passage (Republic 523a–524d), but in brief: on this reading, we should take the perceptible realm to include all the strictly (i.e. sensorily) perceptible things, but also all the other things that one can acknowledge and access without thinking that there is anything unreal or derivative about those strictly perceptible things. On this second reading, not everything that seems is literally perceptible, but the perceptible realm coincides with the realm of seeming; therefore, even though doxa is distinct from perception, it is confined to the per­cep­ tible realm. Perhaps perception is one species of doxa, or perhaps doxa much of a theory of doxa, it does show that it must be go beyond perception, since the appetitive part has perception but not doxa (77b). In the Theaetetus, doxa and perception are ex­pli­ cit­ly distinguished on the grounds that doxa but not perception is an activity of the soul without the body, and has different objects (e.g. being and goodness, rather than proper perceptibles like white and sweet) (184b–186c). In the Philebus, doxa arises from perception (along with memory and certain “affections [pathêmata]” (39a). In the Sophist, one kind of doxa arises from perception this is given a special name, phantasia (264a). (For discussion of the relation between doxa and perception in the later dialogues see especially Frede 1999.) 22  See Chapter 10.1. 23  As Crombie puts it in discussing the Timaeus, doxa “is confined to the level (or levels) at which sense-perception is decisive” (1962, vol. 2, 36).

Restriction to perceptibles  171 operates “with perception” (Timaeus 28a), or perhaps doxa arises from ­perception in combination with other factors, as at Philebus 39a.24 The Two Worlds dialogues may not offer a determinate or consistent theory of the relation between doxa and perception. What they clearly do, however, is to confine them both to the same realm, the ontologically in­fer­ ior realm of Becoming.

5d.  Seeming and reasoning My argument that Becoming is something that seems because it is readily present and manifest risks simplification in another way too: it may suggest that all being-seemed-to is passive and unreflective. This is not Plato’s view: he in fact categorizes certain reflective, critical attitudes as doxai, even in the Two Worlds dialogues.25 This is most obvious in Republic X’s discussion of conflicting doxai in cases of perceptual illusions (602e–603a). When a distant object looks small but you calculate its true size, you find yourself with one doxa in accordance with the appearances, another in accordance with calculation.26 This second doxa does not take perceptual appearances at face value, but instead goes beyond them. Although it is a doxa, it is not based on the unreflective acceptance of how things seem. I have argued elsewhere that this is not an isolated instance in the Republic’s epistemology, but instead fits with a distinction established ­earl­ier.27 In the Line and Cave passages Plato distinguishes between two species of doxa, a complication we have so far mostly ignored: eikasia 24  In the Phaedo, Socrates says that in his youth he held a view on which doxa comes from memory and perception (96b), but this view applies to epistêmê as well as doxa, and so is not a serious candidate for Plato’s considered view in the Two Worlds’ dialogues. 25  It is particularly obvious that he does so in later dialogues, in passages which characterize doxa as the conclusion of an internal dialogue: see Theaetetus 189e–190a, Sophist 263e–264a, Philebus 38b–39a, and my discussion in Moss 2014. As I will argue in Chapter 10, however, this may be a very different view of doxa from what we get in the Two Worlds dialogues. 26  Socrates contrasts “that in the soul which has doxa [δοξάζον] against the measurements” (that is, in accordance with the appearances) with “that which does so in accordance with the measurements” (Republic 603a). 27  See Moss  2014. Grönroos  2013 finds the distinction between being-based and appearance-based beliefs in the Sophist’s distinction between regular doxa and phantasia (Sophist 263e–264b). He argues briefly that this distinction is vaguely anticipated in the Republic (both in the Line passage and the optical illusion passage) as the distinction between “reasoned and unreasoned belief ” (Grönroos  2013, 17); I am arguing that the distinction between appearance-based and (lower-case ‘b’) being-based belief is there fully present.

172  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work (imaging, imagination, conjecture) is set over shadows, reflections, and phantoms; pistis (trust, conviction, faith) is set over the ordinary physical objects of which such things are images (509d–510a, 511e). We might at first wonder what sense to make of this distinction: why should one’s cognitive state change when one shifts one’s eyes from a shadow to the thing that casts it? Most charitably construed, this is the same distinction explained in different terms in Republic X’s optical illusion passage: the distinction between beliefs based solely on perceptual appearances, and beliefs that move beyond such appearances to consider how perceptible objects are in themselves. Eikasia is utterly unreflective acceptance of appearances: Plato characterizes it as set over shadows and images rather than material objects themselves because it recognizes no distinction between objects “as they appear” and “as they are.”28 Pistis is the product of some reflection and reason­ing (logismos), in which we recognize that distinction and try to get to the truth about how things are; that is why Plato characterizes it as set over perceptible objects themselves by contrast with their images. (Plausibly Plato has in mind critical, reflective thoughts not only about the shapes and sizes of perceptible objects, but also about which people and actions are virtuous, which conventions just, and so on: for example, the thoughts we have when we question poetic images of virtue, and reason out for ourselves whom to admire.) Thus much of what Plato calls doxa involves some reflection and reason­ ing. Does this mean that it is a response not to what seems but to reality? It does not. As both the Line and Cave images show, the contrast between a material object and its image is an analogy for the contrast between the whole perceptible realm of Becoming and the whole intelligible realm of Being.29 Recognizing this second contrast makes one realize that the first is insignificant. Consider the casual indifference to the distinction we see in the Cave escapee’s description of the prisoners’ activity as dispute about “the shadows of justice, or about the statues which cast them” (517d). From the

28 Plato uses these phrases in Republic X (598a) in arguing that the painter copies the appearance of the bed rather than the material bed itself. The point easily extends to the illusion case at 602c: just as the bed appears to be different shapes from different angles while itself remaining the same, so would it appear to be smaller in the distance while itself remaining the same. 29  Plato draws this analogy briefly at 510a: “the doxaston is to the gnôston as the likeness is to thing to which it has been made like” (e.g. as the shadow is to the tree). The Cave allegory is an extended expression of this idea: it uses the relation between real trees (outside the cave) and copies of them (puppets and shadows in the caves) to symbolize the relation between intelligible Forms and their perceptible participants.

Restriction to perceptibles  173 perspective of someone who has seen the real thing, the difference between the two levels of image is unimportant—they are both mere images. The move from attending to the lowest level of images to attending to their perceptible originals—the move from eikasia to pistis—is thus not a move away from seemings to reality, although it can be a first step in that direction. Someone who thinks that they have already reached reality at this stage is deluded. They are still in a realm of seeming—that is, of things that are readily present (although not quite so readily as the lowest level of images), and of things that invite their trust. When someone calculates that a distant object is bigger than it looks, even though she is questioning appearances she is still looking for truth only in the perceptible realm. She still takes the senses as authoritative: any doxa she has can in principle be confirmed by them. (“This object would look large if I saw it close up; that stick would look straight if I saw it out of the water.”) To move away from trust in perception entirely—to move away from seemings—requires a much more radical kind of questioning and calculation, a kind we see in the Republic’s “summoners” passage, which I discuss in the next section. This second kind will question not individual features of our perceptions and their objects, but the whole enterprise of searching for truth in the per­cep­ tible world.30 This is a difficult, radical step to take. Sextus and Descartes demonstrate that one can go from noticing small inconsistencies in our perceptions to doubting that the senses can ever be trusted to deliver the truth, but most people never take that second step. That step is difficult, requiring special methodical practices of doubting, precisely because it requires going against our natural tendencies. The perceptible realm tends to present itself to us as being what there is: even when we question some of its details, it

30  Compare two different ways in which someone might question her religion. There is a radical way: she might find pervasive contradictions in her religion, and so come to reject its authority altogether and look for truth elsewhere, thus leaving her religion behind. There is also a more moderate kind of questioning and reflection, one that stays within the system: she might notice occasional contradictions and tensions between what her priest says and what her bible says, and so work to come up with some reconciliation. (Perhaps she realizes that the priest’s sexism makes him predictably unreliable in certain situations, for instance, and learns how to correct for that bias.) If she does this, we can say that she is in a limited way reflective about her religion, but she still takes it as authoritative: any moral belief she has can in prin­ ciple be confirmed by her religion’s views. (“The priest would approve of my becoming a missionary if I were male, and that shows that it’s the right choice.”) This is like realizing that sight reports distant objects as small and submerged objects as bent, and so must be corrected, but still taking the senses as ultimately authoritative. (“That object would look big if I were close to it, and that shows that it really is big.”)

174  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work retains its grip on our trust. In other words, the whole perceptible realm, not just the lowest level of shadows and images, seems real. Thus Plato can allow a distinction between fully passive acceptance of perceptual appearances, and reflective beliefs about perceptible objects as they are rather than as they appear, while still holding that both are responses to how things seem. To get beyond seemings to Being requires a more radical move. In Section 5e, I show how Plato characterizes that move. In the process, I show that our Basic Conception of doxa explains why there is doxa only of Becoming—why there is no doxa of Being.

5e.  Being does not seem We saw in Chapter 6 that Plato takes seeming and being as contrast notions, two sides of an antithesis. I want now to show that the Two Worlds dialogues inflate this distinction, so that just as what seems is not what Is, what Is does not seem. In other words, following Parmenides, Plato draws a sharp line between an ontologically inferior realm that is manifest to us through perception, and an ontologically superior realm that is hidden, obscure, accessible only through intellect. Being lies beyond the readily accessible realm; it can be reached only through a radical questioning and criticizing of everything that invites our trust. Given the above account of seeming, this means that Being does not seem. Therefore, so long as we remain with how things seem to us—that is, at the level of doxa—we cannot even be thinking about what Is. We see this view in Plato’s repeated insistence that Being cannot be accessed through perception.31 Surely he means in part that Forms have no color, sound, or other narrowly perceptible properties. He may however have in mind a broader claim too, the counterpart of what we saw above about Becoming: Forms are not obvious, given, manifest. It does not simply seem to us that there is, for example, a Being of Justice, the same in all just acts. That is instead something we discover only through difficult intellectual labor—labor that begins with a rejection of the senses as guides to the truth. So long as we take the senses as authoritative, and take the world in 31  For example, in the Republic’s characterization of Being as intelligible rather than visible (509d), in the Timaeus’ claim that we grasp Being through intellect, while we grasp Becoming through “doxa with perception” (28a), or in the Phaedo’s argument that we can come into contact with the Forms only when we have left behind our senses along with our bodies (65a–66e.)

Restriction to perceptibles  175 which they are our guides as the ultimate reality—that is, as I just argued, so long as we remain at the level of seemings—we will not have thoughts about what underlies and explains this realm, which is to say that we will not have thoughts about Being. We can detect Plato making just this argument in a passage that, while much-discussed, has been underappreciated for what it shows about the contrast between doxa and epistêmê, and the transition between the two. I have in mind the summoners passage of Republic VII. Socrates is discussing the education that will “draw the soul away from what Becomes toward what Is” (521d). Given that he has earlier identified the former as the object of doxa (doxaston) and the latter as the object of epistêmê (noêton), this should mean that the education lifts the soul out of doxa toward epistêmê, and indeed that is how he will describe it at the end of the discussion (533e–534a).32 Our account of doxa dictates that a move away from doxa should be a move away from seeming. That is, in turning the soul away from Becoming and towards Being, the education is turning it away from things that seem (and hence are objects of doxa) toward things that do not seem (and hence are not objects of doxa). The description of how the soul-turning works illuminates what this could mean. The education that effects the transition will begin by exploiting the contra­dict­ory nature of certain perceptions. To illustrate, Plato gives the ex­ample of sight reporting that the same finger is big (compared to a smaller one) and small (compared to a bigger one), or touch reporting that the same thing is hard and soft (compared to different things). When such things happen, The soul is puzzled about what at all the sense means by ‘the hard’ . . . The messages to the soul are strange and in need of investigation. So it is likely that it is in these kind of cases that the soul first attempts, summoning reasoning and thought [logismon te kai noêsin], to investigate whether each of the things announced [e.g. hard and soft, or big and small] is one or two . . . and if each is one . . . then to get clarity about this, thought is 32  More precisely, in summing up the stages of ascent at the end of the discussion of education, Plato describes it as an ascent from the lowest form of the doxa, eikasia, to the highest form of epistêmê, noesis (533e–534a). He also describes the education as “a turning-around of the soul from a kind of night-day to true day” (521c), which recalls the descriptions of people with doxa as living in a dreaming state, and people with epistêmê as being awake (476c). (I take this as clear license to treat the Line and Cave epistemologies as parallel, or near enough parallel for our purposes: the lower half of each represents the perceptible realm of doxa, the upper half of each the intelligible realm of epistêmê.)

176  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work compelled to observe the big and small not mixed together [as sight did] but distinguished . . . And is it not from this [experience] that it first occurs to us to ask what at all the Big is [ti oun pot’ esti], and the Small? (Republic 524a–c, emphasis added)

If turning our attention from Becoming to Being means moving from doxa toward epistêmê, then doxa must be the state that we are in before we notice contradictions in our perceptions, and that we begin to leave behind when we do notice these. Before the transition, we trust the reports of our senses, not thinking to question them, and therefore not thinking to use any other means of investigation. This is the condition illustrated by Cave prisoners and sight-lovers, of going with how things seem: a perceptible object strikes us as having a certain quality (a finger as big, a spectacle as beautiful, a decree as just), and so we simply accept that it does. We go with how things seem; we have doxa. What the summoners passage shows is that so long as we remain at this level, we are not even having thoughts about Being. For it is only when we stop trusting the reports of the senses that we start even to ask questions about Being: to ask “what at all the Big is.” It is not that at the earlier stage we had false or inadequate views about what the Big is, it is that we had no views at all: we had not even formulated the question. Our cognitions were not “set over” the Being of bigness at all—they were about the particular sizes of particular perceptible things. Thinking about Being thus requires moving past what seems; therefore, doxa is never of Being. Compare the condition of the sight-lovers, those exemplars of doxa who think that what they can see and hear gives the final word about beauty and so “do not acknowledge Beauty itself ” (Republic 476c)—do not ac­know­ ledge the Being of beauty. In virtue of this mistake, they are like dreamers, unwittingly confining their attention to mere images. If a sight-lover begins having thoughts about the Being of beauty—if she stops asking “Is this spectacle more beautiful than that one?,” for instance, and instead starts asking “what at all Beauty is”—she will ipso facto be waking from her dream. She will be moving past the manifest, readily given, trust-inviting images that seem beautiful, and directing her mind to the obscure, hidden, under­ lying reality, what beauty Is. By definition then, since they are not about what seems, such thoughts will not be doxai. Perhaps the best way to bring out the idea is by way of a contrast between the radical questioning of perception in the summoning cases, and the more moderate questioning that can take one from eikasia to pistis. I argued

Restriction to perceptibles  177 above that the latter kind of questioning fails to take us away from ­seemings: when we ask whether a particular object is the size it appears to be from a distance, we are still taking the perceptible world to be the whole world, and taking perception to be our ultimate authority. (We are assuming that if we were to see the object under better conditions, we could see how it really is.) Notably, such questions make no mention of Being: we are not asking what it is to be big or small, but only whether or not a particular object is big or small. The questioning involved in the summoners passage, by contrast, doubts whether the truth about size can be found at all in the perceptible world (“Are bigness and smallness really always mixed up together as my senses report?”), thereby leaving behind seemings; in the process, it brings the mind to think about Being (“Is there instead one thing, the Big Itself, in every way different from the Small? What is that thing?”). Thus this kind of calculation, but not the first, counts as moving beyond how things seem, and as turning one’s mind toward Being. These two steps go together: so long as we remain at the level of seemings we are not thinking about Being. Being does not seem. I suspect this argument will be greeted with skepticism: surely Plato thinks that Forms can seem. When Socrates refuses to relate what seems (dokei) to him to be the case about the Good (Republic 506e), or when he says that the Form of Equal never appears (phainetai) to be unequal (Phaedo 74c), he implies that the Forms seem to us in various ways. (I am not yet addressing the closely related claim that there is textual evidence for doxa of Forms: I turn to that in Section 6.) Does Plato really say that Forms seem? We can attribute to him a consistent view if we take his idea to be that Forms cannot seem directly, but only through items ontologically distinct from themselves, namely perceptibles. Plato very strongly implies such a view when he introduces the distinction between Forms and perceptibles, in the lead-up to Republic V’s powers argument: The Beautiful and the Ugly . . . are each one . . . And about the Just and the Unjust, and the Good and the Bad, and all the Forms, the same account holds: each one is one, but through association with actions and bodies and one another each one, appearing [phantazomena] everywhere, appears [phainesthai] to be many.33 (Republic 475e–6a) 33  . . . αὐτὸ μὲν ἓν ἕκαστον εἶναι, τῇ δὲ τῶν πράξεων καὶ σωμάτων καὶ ἀλλήλων κοινωνίᾳ πανταχοῦ φανταζόμενα πολλὰ φαίνεσθαι ἕκαστον.

178  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work Forms do in a broad sense seem or appear. But they do so only through their images: for Beauty to appear, for example, is for some perceptible thing to participate in it.34 Beauty itself is non-apparent: as we saw above, even to direct one’s thoughts toward it requires the effort of questioning all that is readily present and trust-inviting. To say then that Beauty seems to us to be such-and-such is a loose way of saying that its images seem to us that way. (Analogously, to say that your mother is right there on the television screen is to say that an image of her is there. Mothers themselves cannot get onto screens; they can only do so indirectly, through their images.) Indeed, this appearing is so indirect that in other moods Plato says that only the images appear, while the Form instead Is. We see this in the Symposium: Beauty itself “will not appear [phantasthêsetai] like a hand or face,” but is instead “itself by itself, with itself, always Being [on]” (Symposium 211a–b). We also see this in a passage on Forms and appearance in the Phaedrus. Plato here uses visual language to describe our noetic apprehension of the Forms during our disembodied existence: the Forms are apparitions (phasmata, from the same root as phainesthai and phantazesthai) which we are able to see (epopteuontes) in pure light (Phaedrus 250c); they are a blessed sight and vision (opsin, thean, 250b). These are of course mere metaphors: it is a crucial part of Plato’s argument here, as in the Phaedo (75b–c) that when disembodied we have no senses, and that this is a major epistemic benefit, for now we can grasp the Forms, through intellect. Thus we should take the appearance language as metaphorical too: it is not the kind of seeming that perceptibles do, but instead something analogous to that but far better, a purely intelligible way of being manifest. Now consider what Plato says about the Form of Beauty in particular: in our em­bodied condition Beauty still “glitters most vividly through our most vivid sense,” i.e. sight (250d). Does that mean that the Form is itself ­apparent—a seeming Form after all? No: the claim is that it shines only through its visible images or likeness (eikônes, homoiôma, eidôla, 250a–d):

34  What about “through association with one another?” Many interpreters have proposed excising or amending the text here, or interpreting the phrase as a reference to the co-instantiation of Forms within perceptibles (for citations and discussion see Adam 1902, vol. 2, 363–4). Others, including Adam (op. cit.) take it instead as a reference to the kind of “association of Forms” Plato will address in the Sophist (251a ff): each Form shares in Being, Difference, Sameness, and so on, and so appears to be many (it is, it is different, it is the same, and so on). This would be surprising: nowhere else in the Republic does Plato acknowledge participation of Forms in one another, and the Sophist’s countenancing of such associations is usually taken as a revision of the Republic’s theory.

Restriction to perceptibles  179 Wisdom [phronêsis] would produce terrible love, if such a clear image of it coming through sight were available . . . but to Beauty alone is this allotted. (Phaedrus 250d)

It is the images of Beauty that glitter so vividly, not Beauty itself. Forms are metaphorically apparent to us in our unembodied conidition, but in our embodied condition they do not directly appear to us; all the appearing is done by their images. One passage in the Phaedo is sometimes thought to show that Forms do literally appear to us in our embodied condition: sticks and stones, while being (onta) the same, appear (phainetai) equal to some and unequal to others (74b), while the Equals themselves (the Form) never appeared ­ (ephanê) unequal (74c). But Plato does not here make the positive claim that Forms appear; he instead makes only the negative claim, that they have never appeared deceptively. Sticks and stones can be one way and appear another, precisely because they are things capable of appearing; the Form, he strongly suggests, is not. What about when Plato uses dokein to denote how something which is in fact a Form seems to non-philosophers—for example, how justice seems (dokei) to Polemarchus (Republic 334b)35 or Thrasymachus (Republic 349a)?36 We should take the thought behind such claims to be the same: Justice seems to them only through the various particular, perceptible images of justice. When they say “Justice is helping one’s friends and harming one’s enemies,” or “Justice is the advantage of the stronger,” their use of the abstract noun does not show that they recognize a single Being, Justice itself, behind the many phenomena. Instead, they are talking about just particulars. Like the sight-lovers who make proclamations about Beauty, they can make generalizations about particulars without rising above these to have thoughts about Forms. Alternately (but less plausibly), we might say that they are in fact budding although confused philosophers. They really are trying to identify the Being of Justice; like prisoners who have begun to ascend, they are thinking about

35  “This still seems to me, that justice benefits friends and harms enemies [τοῦτο μέντοι ἔμοιγε δοκεῖ ἔτι, ὠφελεῖν μὲν τοὺς φίλους ἡ δικαιοσύνη . . .].” This certainly looks to be a seeming about justice. 36  Socrates says that in discussing justice and injustice Thrasymachus has been stating “the things that seem [to you] about the truth [τὰ δοκοῦντα περὶ τῆς ἀληθείας],” for example that injustice is a virtue. Shortly afterwards he exhorts him not to answer questions about justice “against your own doxa” (350e).

180  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work “what at all Justice is” (ti pote esti, 524c). In this case we should acknowledge that their thought is directed toward the Form, but we should deny that what they have is doxa. Below I will argue that Plato has the resources to account for such thought, in his notion of a kind of cognition better than doxa although worse than full epistêmê: dianoia. To sum up this Section (5a–e): I have argued that the Basic Conception of doxa makes sense of the Two Worlds dialogues’ restriction of doxa to the ontologically inferior realm of Becoming. Becoming seems, and so we have doxa of it; Being does not seem, and so we have no doxa of it. Thus there is doxa only of perceptibles; there is no doxa of Forms. Despite these arguments, however, and despite all the evidence we saw in Chapters 1 and 2 that Plato carves up cognitive kinds by their objects, many will protest that Plato simply must, and indeed plainly does, acknowledge doxa of Forms. I turn to those objections now.

6. Objections: Doxa of Forms? Some of the widespread insistence on doxa of Forms is motivated by the assumption that doxa is ordinary belief. It is clearly possible to have beliefs— in the sense of opinions or of generic judgments—about Forms: one might for example believe that they do not exist, or that they are very hard to understand. If doxa is belief, then, Plato should surely acknowledge doxa of Forms. I hope to have undermined that motivation by showing that doxa is instead something much more specific, a response to what seems. Nonetheless, the spirit of the objection may still stand. Here is how it might be phrased: Plato clearly recognizes thoughts about Forms that fall short of epistêmê – as well he should, for how could we progress to epistêmê of something without starting from some thoughts about it? Hence they must be doxa: what else could they be? Therefore Plato must acknowledge doxa of Forms.37 Moreover, we have clear evidence that he does acknowledge such doxa: Socrates outright avows doxa about the Form of the Good, at Republic 506c–e.38

37  Vogt argues that Plato regards doxai, construed as beliefs in the generic sense of takingto-be-true, as the starting points of inquiry, and thus must acknowledge doxai about Forms (Vogt 2012, 10 and 68). 38  For arguments that this passage countenances doxa of Forms see among others Fine 1990, Taylor  2008, Vogt  2012. Fine  2016 also finds evidence in the Phaedo, which I discuss below.

Objections: Doxa of Forms?  181 If the objector were feeling charitable, she might even go on to suggest a way that my proposed account of doxa could accommodate doxa of Forms: You can maintain your view that doxa is of what seems, and even your view that Forms do not directly seem, and indeed even many components of a Distinct Objects interpretation of Plato’s epistemology. All you need do is acknowledge that doxa of perceptible things is in an important sense about the underlying Form. In other words, embrace a version of the Content Overlap view (Chapter 1.1, 2.4). Distinguish what doxa is set over (what seems) from what it is about, and you can address all my objections.39

I will first address the alleged evidence that Plato is philosophically and text­ual­ly committed to doxa of Forms, arguing that it is far from decisive. Plato does sometimes say things naturally interpreted as committing him to doxa of Forms, but he has no need in his theory for such doxa, and we can attribute to him an overall consistent theory on which it is not possible (Sections 6a–b). This undermines the motivation for the Content Overlap solution, but Content Overlap may seem independently plausible enough that it is worth considering; I address it in Section 6c.

6a. Between doxa and epistêmê: dianoia The main claim driving the objection is very compelling: Plato certainly presents people who lack epistêmê as nonetheless having thoughts about Forms. Whether or not we allow examples like Thrasymachus’ views of just­ ice (Republic 349a), there are very clear cases throughout the Two Worlds dialogues: Socrates and his interlocutors discuss the Forms extensively, while disavowing epistêmê of them. Consider among many other instances the agreement that each of the Forms is one rather than many, at Republic 476a or 507b, or—an example central to this debate, and to which we will return below—Socrates’ thoughts about the Form of the Good (Republic 506a–e). These certainly seem to be thoughts about Forms. They are clearly not supposed to be instances of epistêmê: Socrates explicitly denies that he or his interlocutors have epistêmê of the Forms (see Republic 506c, 533a).

39  For extended defense of this view see Smith 2000, 2012, 2019; compare Szaif 2007. For briefer remarks to this effect see Lafrance 1981 at 141–2, and Murphy 1951, 123–4.

182  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work Must we therefore accept that such thoughts are doxai, on the grounds that there is nothing else that they could be?40 One response is to deny that these thoughts really are about Forms: they are instead confused thoughts about images of Forms. Only when we have fully, correctly grasped the Forms do we count as having thoughts about the Forms themselves at all; someone who makes mere hypotheses about the Good is no more thinking about the Form than someone who touches your shadow is touching you. Some have taken this approach.41 I find this general line of argument compelling, but I will argue that there is an important distinction to be drawn. Although Plato does indeed think that doxai are too cognitively deficient to count as being about the Forms, he wants to make room for imperfect cognition of Forms, of another kind. In other words, I propose a different response to the objection that Plato must acknowledge doxa of Forms: the objection rests on a false dichotomy. Plato does in fact recognize a category between epistêmê and doxa. There is something he describes as “between doxa and nous” (511d), or “clearer than doxa, darker than epistêmê” (533d).42 This is something that differs sharply from doxa in that that it counts as being set over (epi) intelligibles rather than perceptibles (511d–e), but is somehow inferior to the highest epistemic level, the full grasp of Forms. It is what Plato calls dianoia, “thought”: the cognition exemplified by mathematicians, which uses perceptible things as

40  The analogy between the Good and the sun at Republic 506ff. “is undoubtedly supposed to reveal something about the relation of the Good to the other Forms and it is not presented as knowledge that Socrates has about the Form. The most natural thing, it seems to me, is to suppose that it reveals something of the content of Socrates’ beliefs about the nature of the good” (Baltzly  1997, 266); Baltzly takes it that such beliefs must be doxai (1997, 266). Compare Vogt 2012, 53. 41  Gerson (2009, 41) argues that in doxa, by contrast with epistêmê, we are in touch with propositions, while Forms can only be grasped in an unmediated, “non-representational” way. Woolf (2013) reaches the conclusion from a very different route. Starting from Socrates’ argument in the Theaetetus that you cannot even have a doxa about something unless you already know its distinguishing mark (209a–b), he attributes to Plato the view that you cannot have something as an object of your thought unless you have a clear, accurate grasp of it. A putative deficient grasp of a Form, then, is thus not really of the Form at all. 42  Plato refers to the very highest epistemic kind as nous in the Line passage, implying that this is one species of epistêmê, along with the second-highest level, dianoia; when he returns to sum up the epistemology described in both Line and Cave passages he reserves ‘epistêmê’ for the very highest level, and uses “noêsis” for the whole upper half (533e, quoted below). Let us follow Socrates’ advice not to worry too much about terminology (533d–e), and simply use ‘full grasp of Forms’ for the very highest level. With that in mind, we can see that all his classifications agree in their treatment of dianoia: it is between doxa and the full grasp of Forms we find at the highest level, whatever its name.

Objections: Doxa of Forms?  183 images of intelligibles, and relies on hypotheses (510b–e).43 Dianoia has been largely neglected in the Two Worlds debate, although not entirely. It plays a major role in the Line and Cave epistemologies, however, and is, I shall argue, well suited to play precisely the role that my objectors’ arguments attribute to doxa. In making this argument I am following the lead not only of a few recent scholars (see Gallop 1965, Gonzalez 1996, 273, note 50, and Gerson 2003 at 182–9), but also the Neoplatonists. These philosophers elevated dianoia to a major role on which it fills several gaps left between doxa and epistêmê. In particular, they assigned it the task we are concerned with here: accounting for thoughts which are directed toward Forms without yet fully grasping them. For example, Olympiodorus, commenting on Phaedo 65e, says that the person who comes close but not all the way to knowing (eidenai) the truth is “using the activity of dianoia” (dianoêtikê), while the person who achieves the truth is using the activity of noêsis (noêra energeia) (In Phaedonem, 5.4); see the next section for further citations. To be clear, my aim is not to insist that Plato intended dianoia to play this role, nor that he had a developed account of how it could do so. I am not confident that he noticed the problem of how to account for beliefs about Forms that fall short of knowledge; neither am I confident that he conceived of dianoia as having precisely the right features to be able to solve the problem. Nonetheless, the fact that he included dianoia in his epistemology shows at the least that he has the resources to solve the problem without appealing to doxa. For dianoia is in the right genus: it is, I shall show, something superior to doxa, and about Being, but inferior to a full grasp of Forms. I will start with a broad-strokes account that will be fairly uncontroversial, and that will show dianoia to be in the right general category to account for deficient thoughts about Forms. Then I will outline, without decisively endorsing, a more detailed account of dianoia on which it plays precisely this role, while also conforming to the constraints of objects-based epistemology. Republic V’s simple distinction between doxa and epistêmê gets refined in the Line image: now there are two cognitive kinds over (epi) different 43  Confusingly enough Plato also occasionally uses “dianoia” to refer to something very general, something like “cognition”: we call the dianoia of the philosophers gnômê (i.e. epistêmê) and that of the sight-lovers doxa (Republic 476d); imitative poetry distorts the hearer’s dianoia, unless he knows what sort of thing it really is (Republic 595b). I will bracket this use of “dianoia” in what follows, focusing on what is clearly a narrower, technical sense introduced in the Line passage.

184  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work sections of the visible realm and two cognitive kinds over the intelligible realm (noêton) (511d–e).44 Nous is the highest kind, in which we fully grasp and can give an account of all the Forms rooted in an account of the Form of the Good (511d). Dianoia is the penultimate level, exemplified by geometers and other mathematicians. It is like nous in being set over (epi) intelligibles (511d; cf. 534a).45 It is like doxa in that it makes use of perceptibles, but it differs from doxa in how it uses them—namely, not as objects worthy of attention in their own right, but instead as images of intelligibles: [While geometers] use visible shapes, and make their statements about these, they are not thinking about these, but about those things which these are like, making their statements for the sake of [heneka] the Square itself and the Diagonal itself, but not the one which they draw . . . seeking to see those things which one cannot see except with thought. (Republic 510d–511a; cf. 510b)

Sight-lovers do not acknowledge (nomizein) the Beautiful Itself, but consider perceptible beautifuls the last word (476c); geometers by contrast are aware that there is such a thing as a purely intelligible Square itself, and they use perceptible squares as mere images of it. Plato illustrates this clearly when he returns to dianoia in the context of Book VII’s discussion of the education that brings one out of the Cave. In a passage we saw above ­(Chapter 4.4), he shows that geometers treat diagrams not as an object of study in which truth can be found, but instead as a tool for studying the im­per­cept­ible truth; likewise, astronomers recognize that the motions of visible stars “fall far short of the true ones . . . which can be grasped by logos and thought [dianoia] but not by sight” (Republic 529dc–d). Thus people with dianoia, unlike people with doxa, recognize the existence and importance of intelligibles, and as a corollary recognize the 44 Over the visible realm are eikasia and pistis, which in recapping the divisions Plato c­ haracterizes as two forms of doxa (533e–534a). Over the intelligible are dianoia and nous (or noêsis) (511d–e). In recapping, he switches terminology, calling the last level epistêmê, and saying that it and dianoia are two forms of noêsis (533e–534a). For simplicity’s sake I will stick with his first designation and refer to the highest level as nous. 45  “Are you satisfied as before to call the first portion epistêmê, the second dianoia, the third pistis and the fourth eikasia? And [to call] these last two together doxa, and the first two together noêsis? And [to say that] doxa is about Becoming, noêsis about Being? And that as Being is to Becoming, so noêsis is to doxa, and that as noêsis is to doxa so epistêmê is to pistis and dianoia to eikasia? But as to the relation in what they are set over [ἐφ’ οἷς], and the division into two of each of these, the object of doxa [doxaston] and the intelligible [noêton], let us let that go, Glaucon, lest it involve us in discussions many times longer than the one that came before . . . ” (Republic 533e–534a).

Objections: Doxa of Forms?  185 limitations of perceptibles. In the language of the summoners passage, they have got past a focus on the shapes of particular squares, and can ask the question “what at all the square Is.” That is why Plato counts dianoia but not doxa as being over (epi) intelligibles (511d–e). Although dianoia is cognition of intelligibles, however, its grasp of them is deficient. In dianoia: the soul is forced to investigate from hypotheses . . . In [nous] however, it goes away from hypothesis up to an unhypothetical first principle [viz., the Good] . . . proceeding by and through the Forms themselves . . . Those who study geometry and calculation and such things hypothesize the odd and the even and the shapes . . . .making these things hypotheses [poiêsamenoi hupotheseis auta], not deeming it worthy to give an account of these to themselves or to others.  (Republic 510b–c)

Plato explains further in his discussion of the highest stage, now called dialectic, in Book VII: No one will [say] . . . that there is any other inquiry that attempts to grasp about each thing what it Is. . . As to the others, which we say grasp Being to some extent [tou ontos ti epilambanesthai], geometry and those [studies] that follow it, we see that while they dream about what Is [peri to on], it is impossible for them to see it waking, so long as they use hypotheses that they leave untouched, not being able to give an account of them. (Republic 533b–c)

Someone with dianoia is aware of intelligibles, can discuss them, and use them to deduce true claims—for example, mathematical theorems. Indeed, she is thinking about them, albeit only in a dream-like way. Nonetheless, she does not fully grasp them. She is like someone who, although having escaped the Cave, looks at shadows of the things outside rather than at the things that cast them (532b–c). This is because she cannot “give an account [logos]” of them—cannot define them, using a grasp of the Form of the Good to explain their Being, as dialecticians do. That is why she does not count as being at the top level: And do you call a dialectician the person who grasps the account of the Being of each thing? And the person who is not able to do this, insofar as she is not able to give an account to herself or to another, to that extent you will deny that she has nous about this thing?  (Republic 534b)

186  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work We can thus sum up dianoia’s relation to intelligibles as follows. Someone with dianoia: (a) acknowledges the existence of intelligibles, and tries to think about them, but (b) relies on the use of perceptible images as illustrations of intelligibles, rather than grasping them directly, and therefore (c) only hypothesizes the existence and nature of intelligibles, rather than being able to give accounts of them. Now I will show how closely all this parallels Socrates’ deficient thoughts about Forms. As geometers stand to the Square, so Socrates and his interlocutors stand to the Forms they discuss, on all three counts. We see (a) and (c) explicitly in the Phaedo, where Socrates refers to his views about Forms as hypotheses (100a–b). As Smith 2019 emphasizes, we see (a) and (b) extensively in the Republic’s use of the Sun, Line and Cave images to illustrate views about Forms, for the sun, a line, and the various objects in the Cave allegory are all perceptibles. Indeed, here Socrates even explicitly emphasizes that he is relying on images, and doing so because he does not have a full grasp of the Forms. When Glaucon asks what goes on at the highest epistemic level, Socrates replies, You won’t be able to follow me further . . . for you would no longer be seeing an image [eikona] of what we are speaking of but the truth itself. (Republic 533a)

He goes on to argue that only dialectic can give one a grasp of the Being of things (533a–c). The clear implication is that their discussion must rely on images, and that it must do so precisely because they do not yet grasp the Forms. In other words, they are at the level of dianoia. Note how well this account fits with what Socrates says in the very passage where he is often taken to avow doxa of Forms. (Here I am in agreement with Smith 2019). When asked to state his own dogmata (506b—from dogma, a stronger variant of doxa) about the Good, Socrates refuses, and offers to provide an analogy instead: Haven’t you observed that doxai without epistêmê are all shameful? The best of them are blind – or do those have true doxa [alêthes ti doxazontes] without nous seem to you any different from blind people walking the

Objections: Doxa of Forms?  187 right road? . . . . Let us let go of the what at all the Good itself is for now, for to reach what now seems to me [tou dokountos emoi] is too much for the present attempt. But I am willing to say what appears to be the offspring of the Good and most like it, if you would like.  (Republic 506c–e)

Socrates goes on to argue that the Good is like the Sun: as the Sun is the source of both Becoming and vision in the perceptible realm, so the Good is the source of both Being and epistêmê in the intelligible realm. Commentators often refer to these claims as expressing Socrates’ doxai about the Good (for example, Fine 1990, Vogt 2012, 53). But the lines just quoted shows that this is wrong: Socrates explicitly refuses to state any doxai about the Good. How then should we characterize his thoughts? They are clearly thoughts about the Good. They are not epistêmê, which he denies having, nor are they doxai about the Good, which he refuses to offer. They must then be something in between. This points us toward dianoia, and indeed they fit the description very well. They (a) acknowledge the existence of a purely intelligible Good itself. They (b) use a perceptible object as an image—the sun. And they (c) express undemonstrated hypotheses about the Good: Socrates simply asserts that it exists, and that it is the source of Being and epistêmê, without offering an “account of the Being” of the Good, a definition. Thus Socrates’ thoughts about the Form of the Good fit the characterization of dianoia much better than they do the characterization of doxa. Plato has in dianoia the resources he needs to explain deficient thoughts about Forms without appealing to doxa—without contradicting all the evidence we have seen that there is no doxa of Forms.46 To be clear, I have been arguing only that Plato’s notion of dianoia shows that he left room in his epistemology for something between doxa and a full grasp of Forms, something which is in the right general category to explain deficient thoughts about Forms. I am not arguing that Plato clearly and determinately conceived of dianoia as able to play this role. Indeed, there are several worries about how it could do so, which I will address briefly here. First, as others have noted, there is an important difference in the mathematicians’ attitude toward their hypotheses and Socrates’ toward his. Mathematicians are content with their hypotheses, putting them forth “as if they were clear,” not even aspiring to give accounts of them (510c); Socrates 46  In the next section I address the putative textual evidence that he nonetheless does characterize such thoughts as doxa.

188  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work by contrast recognizes and aspires toward a higher kind of cognition—that is, dialectic.47 Arguably however this is compatible with Socrates’ thoughts being dianoia: Plato may be showing that there is a good use of dianoia, as well as the typical more limited one. Second, the account I gave above glossed over important questions about the identity of dianoia’s objects. Not only is there extensive controversy on this point, but it is also particularly important given the larger project of this book. I will not here attempt to address the various interpretations on their own terms, nor to show that my own proposal fits the text better than its rivals: those are enormous tasks, best left for another occasion. (For a recent interpretation at odds with what I propose here, see Smith 2019.) Instead I will sketch how one could fill out the details in order to construct an interpretation of dianoia that conforms to the constraints of objectsbased epistemology, while also showing dianoia able to account for deficient thoughts about Forms.48 All the evidence we saw in Chapters 1 and 2 that Plato embraces a Distinct Objects epistemology suggests that dianoia must have its own objects, especially when coupled with Plato’s claim that dianoia is “clearer than doxa but darker than epistêmê” (533d).49 If cognitive kinds inherit their properties from their objects, and dianoia is clearer than doxa and darker than the highest kind of cognition, it must have its own objects, which are onto­logic­ al­ly superior to perceptibles but inferior to Forms.50 This is supported by Glaucon’s response in the Line passage to Socrates’ contrasts between the operations of nous and dianoia: You wish to distinguish that [part] of what Is and is intelligible [to tou ontos te kai noêtou] that is studied [theôroumenon] by dialectic as clearer than that which is studied by the so-called crafts [viz., geometry and other examples of dianoia]. (Republic 511c)

47  On this point compare Irwin 1995, 279. 48  I am particularly grateful to Damien Storey for discussion of this issue. 49  Here, as noted above, ‘epistêmê’ names the highest of four levels of cognition, what the Line passage called ‘nous.’ 50  Unfortunately Plato’s description of the Line seems to contradict his explicit claim that dianoia is clearer than doxa: the lengths of the segments correspond to their clarity, and—as Plato does not say explicitly, but as his mathematical instructions about how to construct the line clearly entail—the two middle segments are equal, i.e. dianoia’s segment is equal to that of pistis, the superior kind of doxa. I here join many interpreters who conclude that Plato simply did not embrace the obvious inference that dianoia and pistis are equal in clarity (see for ex­ample Smith 1996).

Objections: Doxa of Forms?  189 The claim is that there is one section of the intelligible realm that is studied by dialectic, and another section studied by dianoia. This is also clearly symbolized in the Cave allegory: at the penultimate stage, one attends to shadows and reflections of the real objects in the outside world, by contrast with the real objects that cast them. This suggests that dianoia is set over images of Forms, but images that are superior to perceptibles. Although dianoia makes use of perceptibles, the images it is “over” are imperceptible—outside the Cave, part of the intelligible realm. Let us then call dianoia’s objects “abstract images.” I propose that Plato has in mind precisely the kind of thing we saw above as the direct focus of dianoetic thought: hypothesized intelligibles. This fits well with interpretations on which Socrates’ thoughts about Forms are instances of dianoia. The idea is that dianoia’s objects include the kind of images and analogies that Socrates employs: the city he constructs in words to serve as a “perfect intelligible model” of the Form of Justice (Sedley  2007, 267); this, the Sun image, and other logoi (discussions, accounts) which are “images of Forms” (Gallop 1965, 120 and throughout). What about the objects which Plato explicitly associates with dianoia: the geometers’ hypothesized squares, angles, and so on? We can understand these too as images of Forms. The Square itself is a Form, but since the geometer cannot give an account of the Being of the square she does not grasp this Form; instead her thought is set over an abstract image of it, square-qua-hypothesis. (Thus this interpretation can, in an oblique way, accommodate the interpretation going back to Aristotle on which dianoia’s objects are “mathematicals”: purely intelligible objects, “different from per­ cep­tible things by their being eternal and unchanging, and different from Forms by their being many of the same kind” (viz., many squares, many triangles, and so on) (Metaphysics 987b14–18; see also 1028b19–21). On the proposed version, mathematicals are hypothesized objects, images of mathematical Forms. (There are many hypothesized squares, all images of one Form of the Square.) One might also develop the suggestion in a different way: perhaps mathematicals are images of Forms because all the Forms are essentially mathematical—unities, proportions, harmonies.)51 Thus I am arguing that to understand dianoia we need to distinguish three levels of object: (i) the perceptible objects which dianoia uses as images (the geometer’s diagrams, the astronomer’s stars, Socrates’ physical

51  For one version of this view of the Form of the Good and other Forms, see Sedley 2007.

190  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work sun or cave); (ii) the hypothesized intelligibles, which are abstract images of Forms, which dianoia is over (the geometer’s hypothesized square, which is not identical with but represented by the visible diagram; Socrates’ hy­pothe­ sized Good-as-like-sun, which is represented by the physical sun); and (iii) the Forms themselves, which dianoia fails to grasp, but “dreams about” (Republic 533c, quoted above).52 A last comment on dianoia: the distinction between (ii) and (iii) seems to conflict with stark Distinct Objects epistemology I have defended in this book, for it opens a gap between what a cognitive kind is over and what it is about. Is this a problem for my accounts of epistêmê and doxa?53 I think it is not, for two reasons. If Socrates’ thoughts about the Good are really about the Good, despite being “over” an abstract image of the Good, this shows what is distinctive about dianoia. Socrates recognizes that he is working with mere images: not only does he recognize that the sun is not the Good, he also recognizes that his analogy between the sun and the Good is limit­ed, a mere hypothesis; he recognizes that he does not grasp the Good itself. This ability to recognize an image as an image allows for a gap between the different kinds of objects: between what cognition is over (ii), and what it is about (iii), not to mention what it uses (i). Such a gap is precluded in doxa, whose signature failure is the failure to recognize that its objects are only images (see 6c below, and Chapter 8). It is also precluded in epistêmê, which fully grasps its objects and has no need for attention to anything else.

6b. Textual evidence for doxa of Forms? Readers may protest that this part of the Republic nonetheless provides strong evidence for doxa of Forms. Even if the Sun analogy expresses Socrates’ dianoia or something like it, in declining to state shameful, blind doxai about the Form of the Good Socrates clearly implies that he has such doxai. What are we to make of this? We could render the passage thoroughly consistent with our theory if we interpreted Socrates’ unspoken doxai as generalizations about perceptible 52  These correspond to the top three levels of the Line. Perhaps we should include the lowest level in category (i) as well: although geometers and astronomers surely prefer to make use of visible objects rather than copies of them, Socrates finds ample use for shadows and reflections in the Line and Cave images. 53  For arguments that these are about precisely what they are over, see especially Chapter 2.1.

Objections: Doxa of Forms?  191 images of the Good—as I have argued we should understand the sight-lovers’ doxai about Beauty, or Thrasymachus’ doxai about Justice (Section  5e above). This is however belied by Socrates’ reference to “what seems to me about what at all the Good itself is”54 (506d–e, emphasis added). This “what at all the x is” is the same language he will use in the summoners passage to refer to Being, by contrast with its images. The strong implication is that he has a doxa about the Being of the Good—the Form. I conclude that in this passage Plato is loosening his terminology. This is however nothing radical for him. The Republic is full of references to epistêmê that do not fit the theory laid out in the central books: Plato refers to various expertises about perceptibles, possessed by non-philosophers— house building, flute playing and the like (428b–c, 438d, 601e–602a)—as epistêmai. Notably these passages are rarely cited as evidence against the Distinct Objects interpretation: evidently it is obvious even to committed Overlappers that they are not relevant to the debate. Perhaps Plato is here using ‘epistêmê’ in accordance with convention, as a synonym for ‘technê;’ perhaps he thinks it clear that what counts as epistêmê in this context would not in the stricter contexts which consider the existence of Forms and of philosophers.55 I suggest that we read 506d–e as employing similarly loose terminology: Plato is relaxing his epistemology and going with convention to use ‘doxa’ to refer to any cognition inferior to the best. A different approach is offered by some Neoplatonist interpretations of further apparent evidence for doxa of Forms, in the Phaedo.56 Here Socrates uses ‘doxa’ and ‘doxazein’ (66b, 67b) to refer to the philosophers’ view that they will attain the truth only after death, when they escape the prison of bodily senses and contemplate “the things themselves” with their souls alone (66d–e). This does indeed look to be a thought about Forms. It is certainly not the kind of thought available to a Cave prisoner, for it recognizes that reality and epistemic success lie in a realm beyond the perceptible. It is the kind of thought that, according to my arguments above, Plato should characterize as dianoia: like Socrates discussing the Form of the Good, these philosophers recognize the existence of Forms and are thinking “for the sake of them” without yet fully grasping them. Neoplatonist commentaries 54  αὐτὸ μὲν τί ποτ’ ἐστὶ τἀγαθὸν . . . τοῦ γε δοκοῦντος ἐμοὶ. 55  For this contextualist interpretation, see Wedgwood 2018. 56  Fine notes this textual evidence in her 2016, along with the Neoplatonic responses, taking them to support her Overlap view.

192  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work on the Phaedo agree with the spirit of this interpretation, while offering an inventive explanation for Plato’s use here of ‘doxa’: This is not the doxa receiving [its content] from below, but that which is accomplished through dianoia. For there are two kinds of doxa.57 (Olympiodorus, In Platonis Phaedonem 5.13) What is this ‘doxa’ of the philosophers?58 It is not from perception . . . nor is it about perceptibles . . . but is like a dogma from dianoia and epistêmê.59 (Damascius, In Phaedonem, 1.103)

On this interpretation, Plato has a theory on which there are two kinds of doxa: one deriving from perception and “about perceptibles,” another derived from dianoia (and epistêmê) and about the intelligible realm. In other words, Plato’s word ‘doxa’ is ambiguous between two referents. This preserves the spirit of the Distinct Objects reading: the claim would be that in all the passages where he seems to endorse Distinct Objects, or to associate doxa strongly with perception and Becoming, Plato has in mind the former kind; in passages like Republic 506c–e, he has in mind the latter instead. Perhaps these scholars are reading back into the Phaedo the ambiguity in ‘doxa’ which we arguably find—as we will see in Chapter  10—in the Theaetetus. There Plato at first uses ‘doxa’ to denote something almost identical with perception, and then uses the same word apparently to denote something more like generic judgement, which results from dianoia (dianooumenê, Theaetetus 190a; cf. dianoia, Sophist 263e).60 At any rate, their interpretative strategy lets stand a use of ‘doxa’ to denote a cognitive kind which is restricted by its nature to the perceptible realm. In sum, there are a small number of passages which imply that there are doxai of Forms; given all the evidence that doxa is restricted to Becoming, however, we should bracket these passages as loose, awkward, or (with the Neoplatonists) ambiguous. With that done, we can attribute to Plato a consistent theory of doxa, as follows. All cognitions lower than full grasp of the Forms must make some use of perceptibles. If one accepts the perceptibles 57  δόξαν οὐ τὴν κάτωθεν δεχομένην, ἀλλὰ τὴν διανοίας οὖσαν ἀποτελεύτησιν· διττὴ γὰρ ἡ δόξα. 58  The commentary here is a series of questions about particular words from Plato’s text, indicating that their sense is mysterious. For example, in the previous lines, Damascius has asked “How is the body ‘bad’? . . . Or is it bad in relation to something . . . ” (1.102). 59  οἷον δόγμα τῆς διανοίας καὶ τῆς ἐπιστήμης. 60 Although in these passages ‘dianoia’ too has a more generic sense, rational thought, rather than what is it at issue in the Divided Line.

Objections: Doxa of Forms?  193 as the last word, then one’s mind is set over perceptibles rather than ­intelligibles, and one has doxa. If one instead uses the perceptibles as mere images of hypothesized intelligibles then one’s mind is set over intelligibles rather than over perceptibles, and so has dianoia, or some un-named ­kindred condition. There is no doxa of Forms.

6c. Is doxa of perceptibles about Forms? Now I turn to a final objection to the claim that there is no doxa of Forms. Some have argued that if beauty (for example) really is a Form, then in having the doxa that something is beautiful, or that beauty is good, one is ipso facto having doxa about the real referent of one’s thoughts, the Form—even if one is not aware of this.61 This suggestion is arguably bolstered by the idea that perceptibles are images of Forms: one might argue that just as a dream featuring a dream-image of one’s mother is a dream about the real thing, one’s mother, so the sight-lovers’ doxa based on perceptible images of Beauty is by Plato’s lights about the real thing, the Form. Would Plato accept such a claim? I am sure that if you put it to him that there are all kinds of relations between people’s thoughts and objects in the world, some of which do not require that the thinker have a grasp of or even be aware of the object—for example, if you were to explain the idea that one could be very liberal in one’s de re belief attributions—he could be brought to recognize that there is some sense in which thoughts about perceptibles are about Forms, just as someone today could be brought to recognize that there is a sense in which Plato’s thoughts about water were about H2O. What I deny is that Plato had any interest in appealing to this idea in his discussion of doxa. The relation between thoughts and objects that interests him is the kind that involves the subject’s awareness of the object. Consider the sight-lovers who are dreaming rather than awake, the Cave prisoners who think the shadows are reality, or the poets, politicians, and craftsmen in the Apology who think themselves wise despite not knowing what is really important. What Plato wants to emphasize when he attributes doxa to such people is that they are preoccupied with the wrong objects and unaware of the right ones. Therefore he needs a terminology on which thoughts are identified by the objects of which the thinker is aware—and thus on which 61  See especially Smith 2000, 2012, 2019; for a version of this idea, focusing on the reference of language, see Harte 2007.

194  The Basic Conception of Doxa at Work it is most natural to say that sight-lovers’ doxai are about mere appearances and not about Beauty itself, even though the appearances are images of the Form. Someone who fails to recognize an image as an image does not merely contingently fail to be aware of the real thing, but is precluded from being aware of it as such—and so it is very natural to say that her beliefs about the copy of it are beliefs only about that.62 Thus we do not find out anything important about Plato’s conception of doxa by noting that doxai are arguably in some sense about Forms—indeed, no more than we would learn something interesting about sight by noting that visible objects are copies of Forms and thus that sight is (in some very strained sense) of Forms. Does Plato then show any signs of interest in the idea that thoughts responding to images could in an important sense be about the originals? Indeed he does—but, as I argued above, only in his discussion of dianoia. Consider again a passage we saw on dianoia, this time in fuller context: (i) All the other crafts are either directed toward human doxai and appetites, or toward becomings and composition, or toward the care and nourishing of things that grow and things that are composed; (ii) as to the others, which we say grasp Being to some extent, geometry and those [studies] that follow it, we see that while they dream about what Is [peri to on], it is impossible for them to see it waking, so long as they use hypotheses that they leave untouched, not being able to give an account of them. (Republic 533b–c)

The arts described in (i) which concern themselves with things that come to be and pass away—that is, in which we exercise doxa—do not at all “lay hold in some way of Being” or “dream about Being,” even though the objects of their attention are indeed images of and participants in Being. It is only 62  I am here largely in agreement with Gonzalez 1996: since perceptibles are “images or imperfect instantiations of forms . . . in recognizing beautiful bodies as beautiful I can be said to have some awareness of the form of beauty they imitate, but this is an awareness that fails to distinguish the form from the imitations . . . It is therefore a dream-like awareness that confounds reality with what only resembles it” (Gonzalez 1996, 272). He goes on to say that doxa is in a limited sense about the Form; my contention is that this limited sense is not one to which Plato wanted to draw our attention. (Confusingly, in the next paragraph Gonzalez offers Socrates’ thoughts about the Good as an illustration, but then explains in a footnote—rightly, to my mind—that they are instead at the level of dianoia (ibid. 273, note 50)). Harte 2006 puts forth a view of mistaking images for originals that is in many ways similar to what I have just proposed, but on which one must in some sense cognize and refer to the originals in order to count as making a mistake.

Objections: Doxa of Forms?  195 when we reach the level of dianoia, described in (ii)63—when we recognize that Being exists, that it is distinct from perceptibles, and that perceptibles are mere images of it—that our thoughts are in any noteworthy way about Being. In sum, the accomplishment of a cognitive power that is over (epi) images can indeed be about the originals in a substantive way, but only when the cognizer recognizes the images as images—and therefore, never in doxa. To return to my claim at the beginning of this section, interpreters are right that Plato recognizes deficient cognitions that are in an interesting sense about Forms, but wrong to think that he must or does categorize such thoughts as doxa. Thus our account of doxa is borne out. Doxa is a response to what seems, and to that alone. Forms do not directly seem; they seem only through their perceptible images. Thus there is no doxa of Forms. This leaves us with the question of why Plato chooses to present a theory of a kind of cognition that is limited in this way to what seems. What sort of thing is doxa, such that it should be limited to what seems—and why should this kind of cognition be so salient to Plato as the main counterpart to epistêmê? I turn to those questions in the next chapter.

63  The mention of geometry, and the talk of relying on hypotheses and not being able to give an account, make it clear that Socrates is referring to what he called dianoia at 510c–511d; just below he uses the term explicitly (533d).

8

What Is Doxa? I have argued that Plato’s Basic Conception of doxa is cognition of what seems. We do not get at what doxa essentially is by starting with familiar notions like judgment or opinion, nor by starting with various features in virtue of which it partly resembles them. Instead, all of doxa’s features are grounded in the fact that its object is what seems, i.e. what is ontologically inferior but apparent. When we add to this Plato’s metaphysical view of the ontologically inferior as a messy image of Being, along with his like-by-like doctrine of cognition, we get a complete explanation of his characterization of doxa. Doxa is a cognitive grasp suited to what seems: thus it is deficient in truth, it is unstable, unclear, imprecise, transmitted by shallow persuasion, and restricted to the perceptible realm. Plato may have had independent reason to attribute many of these features to doxa: perhaps he was preserving contemporary endoxa. But these features are nonetheless explained by the  essential characterization of doxa. Essentially, doxa is cognition of what seems. This may however strike us a very odd thing to choose as a central cat­ egory in one’s epistemology. It sounds like a technical notion, or an ad hoc one, and certainly something marginal to our epistemic lives. Can we get any intuitive grasp on this notion? Does it correspond to anything recognized anywhere else in epistemology? Can we understand why Plato would choose to devote so much attention to it? In this chapter I will argue that, properly understood, the notion of cognition of what seems is in fact central to Plato’s thought. Throughout the dialogues Plato is particularly concerned to point out and warn against two cognitive deficiencies: (1) the tendency to mistake images for reality, and (2) the failure to look beyond particular phenomena to underlying unifying explanations. Given his epistemology and metaphysics, Plato holds that these two deficiencies go together, and thus he is  concerned with a particular way of thinking that exemplifies both. This way of thinking, moreover, is naturally characterized as cognition of what seems. Plato’s Epistemology: Being and Seeming. Jessica Moss, Oxford University Press (2021). © Jessica Moss. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198867401.003.0009

Doxa as dreaming  197 I will address the two cognitive deficiencies in turn, showing that Plato is fixated on them, that he views them as cognition of what seems, and that he explicitly treats them under the rubric of doxa; I will also explain how they are connected, and will note where others have agreed on this interpretation of doxa. In Chapter  9, I show why Plato makes doxa thus understood so central to epistemology.

1.  Doxa as dreaming Consider how Plato introduces doxa in the powers argument of Republic V. This text is central to our understanding of both doxa and epistêmê in the Republic: it lays the groundwork for the distinction between them, and thereby for the entirety of the Republic’s epistemological discussions. We might thus expect him to introduce them by way of some attempt at def­in­ ition, but he does not. Nor does he begin by citing the characteristics he associates with them in what follows—for example, the infallibility of epistêmê and the fallibility of doxa (477e). Instead, he introduces his cognitive kinds via exemplars: doxa is the way of thinking exemplified by sightlovers, epistêmê the way of thinking exemplified by philosophers. To describe the difference between these two types of cognition, what he gives us is a metaphor: The person who acknowledges [nomizôn] beautiful things, but neither acknowledges Beauty Itself nor is able to follow when someone tries to guide him to the gnôsis of it—do you think that he lives dreaming or waking? Consider: isn’t dreaming this, if someone whether in sleep or while awake thinks that the likeness is not a likeness but rather the thing itself to which it is like [the original]? – I would certainly say such a person is dreaming. – What about the person who is opposite to these, who thinks that there is some Beauty Itself….? – Very much awake. – Surely then we would correctly say that the thought [dianoian] of the one, since he knows, is knowledge [gnômê], and that of the other is doxa, since he has doxa [doxazontos]? (Republic 476c–d)

Doxa is like dreaming—and that is the most informative thing to say about it. There is no further argument to establish that the sight-lovers have doxa: they have that status because they are like dreamers who think they are

198  What Is Doxa? awake, attending to mere images of Beauty while ignoring the real thing, and mistaking the images for reality. Clearly Plato takes this to be an important metaphor for doxa. He uses it again in describing his next illustrations of doxa.1 Cave-prisoners are living in a dream: a city ruled by people who have left the cave and seen the truth is the only one “governed by people who are waking rather than dreaming” (520c), for the move from the cave to the real world is “a turning-around of the soul from a kind of night-day to true day [alêthinên]” (521c). He uses the metaphor again in distinguishing ordinary people from philosophers: someone who examines things in accordance with seeming [kata doxan] rather than Being only has doxa, and thus “spends this present life dreaming” (534c). This last passage reminds us very explicitly how the idea of doxa as dreaming fits with the Basic Conception of doxa. What seems are images and appearances, while reality is non-apparent (Chapter 7.5); thus confining one’s attention to what seems while ignoring the underlying realities means mistaking images for reality—that is, dreaming. That is one handle we can get on the notion of doxa, then. Doxa is, like delusive dreaming, the mistaking of an image for what is real. This may seem to us a condition of only minor interest or epistemological relevance: today none but a radical skeptic would think we spend much time in this condition. Plato, however, clearly considers it a pervasive condition: the Cave prisoners are “like us” (515a); the sight-lovers and their fellow dreamers are the targets and products of the culturally pervasive poetry, sophistry, and rhetoric that present mere images instead of reality (for example Republic 600e, 602b). In the book’s final chapter I will argue that Plato also considers this mistaking of images for reality to be the most ethically significant cognitive deficiency, and for this reason assigns it a central place in his epistemology. An important clarification is in order: does Plato think that all doxa is delusive, or does he recognize an equivalent of lucid dreaming—focusing on images while at the same time recognizing them as such?2 We saw some reason to think that the philosopher-rulers have doxa about perceptibles, 1  Cave prisoners are confined to the realm that symbolizes the visible realm of becoming (517b), earlier called the realm of doxa (doxaston, 510a); Plato explicitly labels the prisoners as having doxa (doxazein) at 516d. 2 In dianoia one attends to perceptible images but one’s thought is turned toward their originals; I am asking whether Plato recognizes a different possibility: attending to perceptibles in their own right, while in the background recognizing that they are images of Forms.

Doxa as atheoretical thought  199 despite recognizing these as images of Forms (Chapter 4.5). Certainly in the Timaeus the world-soul has doxa of perceptibles, despite also having nous of intelligibles (Timaeus 37b–c). Moreover, the Republic’s sight-lovers, those paradigmatic dreamers, are extreme cases: they are described as not merely having doxa, but as loving it—they are philodoxoi (480a). Perhaps it is their attachment to their doxa, rather than the mere condition of having doxa, that makes them unable to recognize perceptibles as mere images. Here then is a speculation: Plato thinks that attention to what seems tends overwhelmingly to lead to acceptance of what seems as real (delusive dreaming), but that awareness of the original can allow one to navigate the dream-world while recognizing it as such. (The philosopher-ruler for ex­ample could have a fictionalist attitude: “According to the fiction that there is justice in the perceptible world, I judge that this course of action is the just one for the city to take.”) If so, then delusive dreaming is paradigmatic of doxa but not essential to it. Doxa is cognition of what seems; what seems tends to, but need not always, convince us that it is real.

2.  Doxa as atheoretical thought There is a second cognitive deficiency that Plato emphasizes throughout the dialogues, that he also characterizes as doxa, and that he also would nat­ur­ al­ly construe as cognition of what seems. I have in mind what we might call atheoretical thought: confining one’s attention to particular phenomena, rather than going beyond these to seek hidden, underlying, unifying ex­plan­ ations. This is a category we can easily recognize, even though it is not the focus of attention in contemporary epistemology. (If for example you have ever felt frustrated with students who fixate on the particular details of a thought-experiment rather than attempting to draw general conclusions, you are familiar with the phenomenon!) Plato repeatedly draws attention to this way of thinking, treating those who are stuck in it as epistemically inferior, and sometimes explicitly la­bel­ ing their thinking as doxa. We have already seen one notable instance of this, in the summoners passage (Republic 523a–524d): one leaves the realm of doxa behind only when one stop asking if particular perceptible fingers are big or small, and instead asks “what at all the Big is.” Doxa is focused on particular, observable properties of particular objects or events; it has no truck with non-observable things like unifying essences.

200  What Is Doxa? We can see just this same mindset in the Republic’s exemplars of doxa, the sight-lovers, who attend to beautiful things but cannot be brought to acknowledge the Beautiful itself (Republic 476c). They confine their thoughts to particular, observable phenomena; presumably they are able to make generalizations about these; they are however unable or unwilling to think beyond these to underlying universal truths. As Stokes puts it, they do not go in for “intellectual abstraction” (Stokes 1992, 106). We find a characterization of the same mindset in a passage with notable echoes of the ascent from the Cave, the Theaetetus’ digression about the difference between the philosopher and the lawyer: It escapes [the philosopher’s] notice if he is human or some other beast; but what at all a human is [ti de pot’ estin] and what befits such a nature . . . this he seeks and investigates . . . Whenever he’s forced to converse about the things at his feet and the things before his eyes he’s laughable . . . Whenever however he drags up someone upward,3 and the other is willing to step out from “What injustice did I do to you or you to me?” toward the investigation [skepsis] of justice itself, and injustice, what each of them is and how it differs from all other thing . . . the tables are turned (Theaetetus 174b–175d)

The philosopher is concerned with things “upward,” while the lawyer is concerned with “things at his feet and before his eyes,” i.e. the perceptible realm. Although Plato uses no explicit epistemic vocabulary here, the Two Worlds dialogues would say that the one who looks up to the intelligible realm has epistêmê, while the one who stays down in the perceptible realm has doxa. Moreover, just as in the summoners passage, the epistemically inferior person confines his attention to questions like whether a particular thing has some property F (is human, just), while the person who ascends to epistêmê does so by asking “what at all the F is.” Plato is again contrasting the philosopher’s interest in abstract, universal truths with a kind of thinking stuck at the level of perceptible particulars—doxa. We also see Plato very prominently drawing attention to this same mindset throughout the Socratic dialogues, where Socrates repeatedly attempts to turn his interlocutors away from a certain kind of wrong answer to the question “What is virtue,” or piety, or courage, and toward one that would

3  ἑλκύσῃ ἄνω, a clear echo of the Cave allegory (Republic 515e).

Doxa as atheoretical thought  201 manifest epistêmê. The right kind of answer is an account of the essence, the unifying, universal cause of particular phenomena being as they are; the wrong kind of answer is, once again, fixated on the particular individual phenomena themselves. See for example Socrates’ complaint to Euthyphro: “I did not bid you to teach me one or two of the many pious things, but that form [eidos] itself, by which all the pious things are pious” (Euthyphro 6d); compare his complaint that Meno has offered him a “swarm” of virtues, rather than the one thing that makes them all virtues (Meno 72a–c). The deficient mindset is illustrated with particular clarity by Hippias’ refusal to recognize any such thing as “the beautiful,” above and beyond particular beautiful things, in the Hippias Major: Socrates: Are not all beautiful things beautiful by [by virtue of] the beautiful? – Hippias: Yes, by the beautiful. – Soc: This being something?…Tell me then, what is this, the beautiful [ti esti touto to kalon]? – Hip: Does the one who asks this want to find out anything but what is beautiful [ti esti kalon]? – Soc: I do not think so, but what the beautiful is, Hippias. – . . . Hip: These do not differ . . . I will answer what the beautiful is . . . A beautiful maiden is beautiful….[This] is what seems so to everybody [i.e. what every­body thinks: ho pasin dokei] (Hippias Major 287c–288a)4

Hippias claims to have epistêmê about beauty, just as Meno claims to have epistêmê about virtue, and Euthyphro about piety. In each case Socrates argues that his interlocutor’s inability to give the right kind of answer to the “what is x” question—their inability to move past atheoretical concern with particulars—shows that they lack epistêmê; the obvious implication is that they have doxa instead. A final example of Plato’s interest in this mindset: consider his contrast in the Gorgias between technê (craft, expertise), and empeiria (experience). Empeiria is an epistemically inferior condition, possessed by many who purport to have genuine expertise; in this way the distinction is parallel to that between doxa and epistêmê. Moreover, empeiria’s signature deficiency is its inability to give an account of the nature and the cause of the phenomena with which it deals.5 It thus shares with doxa a limitation to particular 4  Stokes 1992 also draws attention to the comparison between Hippias and the Republic’s sight-lovers; see also Baltzly 1997. Even if the Hippias Major is apocryphal, the author clearly means to portray a mindset which is the same one we find in many of Socrates’ interlocutors. 5  Flattery “isn’t craft [technê], but mere empeiria, because it has no account of the nature of whatever things it applies [or to what] it applies them, so that it’s unable to state the cause

202  What Is Doxa? perceptible phenomena, by contrast with hidden, universal causes. I suggest then that Plato views empeiria as a special species of doxa, or a capacity constituted by doxai; his denigration of empeiria in the Gorgias is yet another instance of his concern with atheoretical thought. I hope to have shown that that Plato is interested in characterizing and warning against the dangers of a mindset that we might call atheoretical thought, that he consistently contrasts it with epistêmê as an inferior ­epi­stem­ic condition, and that he sometimes explicitly labels it as doxa. It should be obvious from my arguments in Chapter 7 how this characterization of doxa fits with the Basic Conception. The realm of particular, perceptible phenomena is the realm of what seems, by contrast with the realm of ­unifying, hidden, intelligible Being. Confining one’s attention to particular phenomena thus amounts to cognizing only what seems.6 To put it more metaphorically, and make explicit the connection with the other characterization of doxa I drew out above, doxa is atheoretical because doxa is dreaming. Doxa mistakes images for realities, where most gobally this means mistaking the realm of perceptible particulars for the entirety of what there is—which amounts, on Plato’s ontology, to ignoring essences and causes, i.e. to being atheoretical. It is no coincidence that Plato fixates on and unites under one label these two cognitive errors—being stuck with images and being stuck with particular phenomena—for on his view they are two descriptions of the same failing: being stuck with what seems.

3.  Counterparts and extant interpretations The idea that doxa is cognition of what seems is, as I mentioned above, prominent in Vogt 2012, and is a centerpiece of Cornford’s work on Plato.7 Although Cornford does not put it this way, he holds that doxa is something like dreaming: focusing on appearances rather than reality. (See also

[aitia] of each thing” (Gorgias 465a; cf. 501a). Flattering knacks like rhetoric have other failings—they are concerned with pleasure rather than the good—but this is their distinctively epistemic failing, and as 465a shows it is this failing that constitutes them as mere empeiria. 6  Again, if the philosopher-rulers do have doxa, we can imagine them switching in and out of this mindset, although never fully inhabiting it since they are of course aware of the under­ lying Forms. 7  The view is mentioned in his commentaries on the Republic, Timaeus, and Theaetetus, as well as in his discussion of Parmenides (Cornford 1933, 1935, 1937, 1941).

Counterparts and extant interpretations  203 Crombie 1962.)8 Smith 2019 emphasizes the connection between doxa and dreaming, in arguing (as I did in the previous chapter) that thoughts like Socrates’ thoughts about the Good are something better than doxa, namely dianoia. Harte (2006) takes the difference between dreamers and wakers— the mistaking of images for reality—to be key to understanding the difference between those who lack epistêmê and those who have it. What about the idea that doxa is atheoretical thought? Although the view has fallen out of favor—and indeed, to judge by current scholarship, largely even out of memory—there is in fact a long tradition of interpreting Plato this way.9 Ficino finds in the Theaetetus the view that doxa is “particular reasoning” by contrast with universal reasoning.10 Proclus, working with a similar interpretation of the Timaeus, emphasizes doxa’s lack of access to causes:11 The doxastic [power] comprehends the logoi of perceptibles, and is the thing that cognizes the beings of these,12 and contemplates the that, while being ignorant of the cause . . . For that is also how correct doxa differs from epistêmê, in that it cognizes the that only, while the latter is also capable of contemplating the cause.13 (Proclus in Timaeum 2.248 11–22, comment ad Timaeus 28a; cf. 2.343.10–11) 8  “Knowledge . . . is the devouring of something real. The mathematician who knows all about triangles . . . has devoured triangularity; triangularity has become part of his mental equipment. The school-boy on the other hand . . . has devoured not triangularity but a likeness of it only; and his state is one not of knowledge but of belief. The difference between the two states is that in knowledge what has been devoured is an objectivity entity, whereas in belief what has been devoured is no more than a likeness of such an entity” (Crombie 1962, vol. 2, 42). 9 Others have defended a closely related view: doxa is perception-based belief (see Didaskalikos 4.5; Gerson 2009 Chapter 3). The atheoretical-thought interpretation is in essence a more liberal version of the perception-based-belief interpretation: it allows as doxa thoughts which arise only indirectly from perception, or which are difficult to trace to any sensory perception at all, while still confining doxa to the realm where perception is authoritative, by contrast with the realm of intelligible Beings. 10  Opinio “judges all these things [features of perceptibles] in its own proper and particular way, at certain times and places and circumstances . . . For this reason there is need of another power . . . We say that this [latter] reasoning or cogitation is universal, while we call opinion itself particular reasoning and cogitation [opinione ipsam particulare ratione cogitationemque]” (Summary of Theaetetus, Divini Platonis Opera Omnia, 92). 11  In this discussion and throughout he also distinguishes both from dianoia, which like doxa cognizes perceptibles, but unlike doxa grasps their causes as well as what they are. 12  As Lautner puts it, this claim means not that doxa grasps the “hidden essences” of perceptibles, but rather that unlike perception it grasps “that all the proper perceptibles inhere in one object,” such as the apple underlying the red and sweet (Lautner 2002, 258–9); see my brief discussion of Proclus’ In Timaeum 2.249.13–27 in Chapter 1.3. 13  τὸ μὲν ὅτι θεωροῦν, τὴν δὲ αἰτίαν ἀγνοοῦν. . . τὸ ὅτι γινώσκει μόνον, ἐκείνης καὶ τὴν αἰτίαν θεωρεῖν δυναμένης.

204  What Is Doxa? On Proclus’ version, doxa sounds very like Aristotle’s empeiria (experience) (Metaphysics I.1, Posterior Analytics II.19, Nicomachean Ethics VI.7–8). Empeiria is perception-based cognition that operates on particular things, registering their similarities enough to make generalizations about them and to manipulate them for practical purposes, but without ever recognizing the underlying universals that explain why they are as they are. Aristotle contrasts it with higher cognitive kinds—phronêsis, technê, nous—which grasp universals and causes.14 This notion of empeiria goes on to play a ­central role in the debate between Empiricist doctors, who forswear the attempt to discover hidden causes of perceptible phenomena, and Rationalist doctors who engage in just this inquiry (see Galen, On the Sects for Beginners, Chapter 5, and M. Frede 1990). It also shows up in the closely related debate between Skeptics, who forswear inquiry into non-evident, hidden natures and causes in general, and their dogmatist opponents who build theories about such things (see Sextus, Outlines of Pyrrhonism 2.97–129). If I am right, these philosophers are all discussing close descendants of Plato’s doxa. This view of Plato’s doxa is echoed by many interpreters in more recent history. It is strongly implied by Bosanquet’s description of doxa as the level at which “commonplace minds are content to rest, while those possessed by the true spirit of science—the philosophers—insist on criticizing all judgments till in every group of phenomena they have detected a single and central principle” (1895, 213, in summarizing Republic 479a ff.). Nettleship draws a similar contrast between the mind of one with doxa and “the philosophic mind,” where the latter “constantly looks for principles or laws or unities of which the manifold of our experience is the phenomenon” (1906, 195). Hackforth describes doxa as “the state of mind that cannot rise above perceptibles” (1945, 127); Havelock gives a lengthy account of doxa as “the non-abstract state of mind” (1963, 248).15 Two books published in the same year in different languages argue at length that, in the contexts where Plato associates doxa with the perceptible realm by contrast with the intelligible, he has in mind empirical cognition or empirical knowledge (Sprute  1962

14  For example: “We believe that knowing [εἰδέναι] and being proficient belongs more to craft than to experience….This is because craftsmen know the cause while the [merely] experienced do not. For the experienced know the that but don’t know the why, while craftsmen know the why and the cause” (Metaphysics I.1 981a24–30). 15  On Havelock’s view Plato has in mind specifically the mindset inculcated by the tradition of oral poetry. I think this is too narrow, but he is right to see connections; we should take that mindset as paradigmatic but not exhaustive of doxa.

Doxa and belief  205 and Gulley  1962). Even the paper that helped to spark the Overlap ­movement, Gosling 1968, recognizes this as one strain in Plato’s account of doxa.16 In recent years the view has largely disappeared, with occasional resurgences;17 a new book on Plato’s epistemology proposes an account that we can see as a version of this view, on which doxa is always of particular concrete tokens, while epistêmê is of abstract types (Rowett 2018). On some of these accounts this is Plato’s core or sole notion of doxa; on others, his use of ‘doxa’ is ambiguous between several notions, including something like generic belief, but this is the notion he has in mind in the contexts that invite the Distinct Objects reading. Indeed this interpretation goes very much hand in hand with the Distinct Objects reading, and owes much of its motivation to that reading. The claim that doxa is restricted to perceptibles, so problematic when doxa is construed as judgment or opinion, becomes not only reasonable but almost analytic when we interpret doxa in this way instead. There is no mystery in saying “There is no empirical cognition of Forms,” or “Those who occupy the non-abstract state of mind are not thinking about Forms”; indeed these claims are obviously true. The challenge to this interpretation of doxa is then primarily to show that it is in fact well-grounded in Plato’s texts rather than cooked up simply to make sense of the Distinct Objects passages. Many of those who have offered versions of the interpretation have done this very well, and I hope to have added to this support. The main contribution I wish to make is to add that doxa has this character precisely because it is cognition of what seems.

4.  Doxa and belief Now that we have a developed account of Plato’s doxa we can return to a question raised at the start of the book: how does it relate to our con­tem­por­ ary notion of belief—either in the sense of generic judgment, or in the sense of belief that falls short of knowledge, what we might call opinion? I have

16  Sight-lovers are inadequate because “they try to answer questions about beauty and the rest by empirical observation. So the δόξα in question is tied to empirical observation, and there is a tendency throughout the Republic to echo Parmenides’ division whereby δόξα is the best you can hope for if you concentrate on observation” (Gosling 1968, 127). 17  “In Book 5 of the Republic, Plato follows Parmenides in his characterization of opinion as the mental condition of ordinary people who take what their senses tell them for knowledge” (Schofield 2011, 54, on the sight-lovers).

206  What Is Doxa? already given extensive arguments that it is quite different from either of these, so much so that we go wrong in trying to use our views about belief to guide our interpretation of doxa. Doxa is defined by its objects, while judgment and opinion are topic-neutral. (As with my discussion of know­ ledge and epistêmê, I want to urge that this distinction is orthogonal to the question of whether doxa is a propositional attitude: if it is, the propositions in question can only be about a certain kind of object.) Hence doxa is confined to perceptible things, while one can make judgments or form opinions about anything at all. Nonetheless, as with epistêmê and knowledge, one could arguably trace a lineage from Plato’s notion of doxa to our modern notions of belief. I will discuss the case of judgment in the next chapter: arguably in the Theaetetus and other later dialogues, Plato metaphysically deflates the Basic Conception of doxa as cognition of what seems so that what is left is the notion of how we take things to be. The connection to opinion is stronger. If we start with the notion of a cognitive response to what seems, and then interpret seeming not as an ontological notion at all but instead as a purely epistemic one—how things strike the subject, how the subject tentatively or shakily takes things to be—then we get the idea of a cognitive condition whose hallmark is subjectivity, instability, and a deficient grasp on truth; in other words, we get something very like the modern notion of belief that falls short of knowledge.

5. Why doxa? I hope to have shown in this chapter that cognition of what seems is neither an obscure nor an ad hoc notion. It is instead a cognitive condition with which Plato is centrally concerned in his epistemology; it is also something perfectly intelligible to us, although far from the center of epistemology today. The obvious question then arises: why should this particular cognitive condition play such a large role in his epistemology—why should it be  the salient inferior condition which he chooses to focus upon, and to contrast with epistêmê? Answering that—along with the corresponding question about epistêmê understood as cognition of Being—is the task of the final chapter. First, I will turn to consider how the account of Plato’s epis­tem­ol­ogy developed here makes sense of his views outside of the Two Worlds dialogues.

9

Epistemology in the Earlier Dialogues Does Plato have an objects-based epistemology throughout the dialogues? We should expect the answer to be no. An epistemology on which cognitive kinds are distinguished, defined, and qualitatively determined by their objects depends on a detailed, robust metaphysical view of the objects of cognition—and so we should not expect to see this kind of epistemological view in dialogues without a developed metaphysics. Plato’s particular version of objects-based epistemology, I have argued, depends on a meta­phys­ic­al view which inflates the distinction between ontologically privileged Beings and ontologically inferior seemings—and so we should not expect to see this kind of epistemological view in dialogues without a full-blown Two Worlds metaphysics. Nonetheless, as I have already suggested at several points, the epistemological views we find fully developed in the Two Worlds dialogues are anticipated in the earlier dialogues, and survive in some form in the later ones.1 I want now to show in a bit more detail that this is so, and to examine the repercussions for our understanding of these dialogues. I will not argue that the Basic Conceptions are fully developed in these dialogues, but I will argue that they are at work—that what the Two Worlds dialogues present is best understood as a highly developed version of a view Plato worked with all along. A warning: my discussion in this chapter and the next will be brief and sketchy. I ignore many dialogues altogether; even where I give sustained treatments, I ignore many important details, and engage very little with the extensive secondary literature. My aim here is simply to show, in broad strokes, how to read the earlier and later dialogues through the lens of the epistemology we find in the Two Worlds dialogues. I leave more thorough

1  I use these chronological terms for convenience and without commitment, but the arguments of this chapter do fit naturally with a developmentalist account of Plato’s works on which views nascent in the Socratic dialogues are developed in the Two Worlds dialogues, and then questioned in dialogues like the Theaetetus. Plato’s Epistemology: Being and Seeming. Jessica Moss, Oxford University Press (2021). © Jessica Moss. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198867401.003.0010

208  Epistemology in the Earlier Dialogues treatments—including a defense of the resulting readings against many rivals—for other occasions.

1.  Epistêmê in the earlier dialogues In Chapter 3 we saw that the Two Worlds dialogues consistently privilege certain items over the rest, mark them with various phrases involving the word ‘being,’ and make these things the province of epistêmê. Although the earlier dialogues show no developed doctrine of Forms, they do show striking instances of this same pattern. That is, here too Plato is working with the view that epistêmê is of Being. To begin with a very clear example, Socrates rejects Euthyphro’s def­in­ ition of the pious as the god-loved on the grounds that it reveals only an affection (pathos) of the pious rather than its being (ousia) (Euthyphro 11a). Thus here we have another contrast between something labeled ‘being’ and something else: (Contrast 6) The Being of something versus its affections. Here feature x—the feature which earns something the title ‘being’—is ­evidently something like being-an-essence. The same seems to be the case in a second contrast prevalent in the Socratic dialogues: (Contrast 7) What Fness Is versus the many F things (Euthyphro 6d, Laches 191d–e, Meno 72a–d, 74d) Here too feature x is something like being an essence, something that combines universality and explanatory power: the being of F is that one thing, the same in all F things, in virtue of which all F things are F. Both of these contrasts clearly anticipate ones we see in the Two Worlds dialogues between Forms and perceptibles: in particular, contrast 7 looks almost identical to Contrast 3 (Phaedo 74d–76d, Republic 507b), and in drawing it Plato identifies “what Fness is” with the form (idea, eidos: Euthyphro 6d–e, Meno 72c). Nonetheless, there is no evidence that he is yet working with the full-blown theory of Forms. Nor indeed does he seem to be working with any full-blown hierarchical ontology of the kind we get in the Two Worlds dialogues: nowhere in the Socratic dialogues do we get the idea that non-essential features of Fness, or the many F things, are shadowy

Epistêmê in the earlier dialogues  209 images of the essence. There is however a crucial parallel to the contrasts we see in the Two Worlds dialogues: certain things are somehow special, and the way to mark this is with the label ‘being.’ Moreover, even if the Socratic dialogues do not subscribe to a fully hierarchical ontology, they do strongly suggest that these special things—roughly, essences—are in some way fundamental, and the other things somehow derivative: in asking “what at all piety is” (hoti pot’ eiê), for example, Socrates is seeking that by which other things are pious, i.e. the cause or explanation or ground of other things being as they are (Euthyphro 6d–e, cf. Meno 72c).2 Thus the contrasts we have seen mark a substantive distinction within the realm of the things that exist: certain things, labeled with ‘being,’ are priv­il­ eged above the rest in a way that at least prefigures the Two Worlds’ distinction between ontologically superior and inferior levels. With some caution, then, I will use the capitalized ‘Being’ here too: even if he does not yet have a developed metaphysical theory of degrees of being, and even if he does not yet downgrade the other items in his ontology, Plato is using ‘being’ to mark out things which are somehow ontologically special. Moreover, here too the Beings are the province of epistêmê. (Below I consider the important question of whether or not epistêmê in these dialogues is only of Being; for now I want to show that Being’s status as epistêmê’s object is at the least a privileged one.) The definition Socrates demands from Euthyphro is meant to vindicate Euthyphro’s claim to epistêmê about the pious (Euthyphro 4e–5a): if Euthyphro has this epistêmê, he must be aware of the Being of the pious. The assumption again is that epistêmê has Being as its special object. We can discern this same idea in Socrates’ frequent insistence throughout the definitional dialogues that someone with epistêmê of Fness must be able to give a special kind of statement (logos) about Fness: one that says “what at all it is” (hoti pot’ estin, Euthyphro 11a, Meno 71a; ti pote on, Laches 191e), “the being, what at all it is” (peri ousias, hoti pot’estin, Meno 72b), “being an F” (tôi melittas einai, Meno 72b), or “that which is Fness” (ho tunchanei ousa aretê, Meno 72c–d) (emphases added). When Socrates characterizes the account necessary for epistêmê of something as an account of what it is, he is again correlating epistêmê with the Beings. (One might object that the emphasis is on the ‘what’ rather than the ‘is’: the contrast is between what something is and what it is like (Meno 71a–b). But Socrates equates “what it is” with the ousia (Meno 72b; cf. Euthyphro 11a), 2  τὸ εἶδος ῷ πάντα τὰ ὅσια ὅσιά ἐστιν . . . μιᾷ ἰδεᾷ τά τε ἀνόσια ἀνόσια εἶναι καὶ τὰ ὅσια ὅσια (Euthyphro 6d–e; ἕν γέ τι εἶδος . . . δι’ ὃ εἰσὶν ἀρεταί (Meno 72c).

210  Epistemology in the Earlier Dialogues and this encourages us to hear, in these mentions of “what something is,” an emphasis on the ‘is’ as well.) Just as in the Two Worlds dialogues, then, to have epistêmê about any subject one must grasp a special kind of item, distinguished from ordinary things and marked off with variants of the word ‘being.’ I want now to show briefly that two other important features which these dialogues attribute to epistêmê could in principle be explained by epistêmê’s association with Being. In Section 3, I will consider whether this is in fact Plato’s intention: whether he is in these dialogues already thinking of epistêmê’s relation to Being as the bedrock principle which explains its other features, or instead simply as one important feature among others. First, the connection with Being can explain the early dialogues’ def­in­ ition­al requirement. Socrates’ insistence that anyone with epistêmê about something must be able to give a definition of that thing has often been taken to show that Plato has a very strange view of knowledge: that he was confused about knowledge,3 that he departed sharply from contemporary usage by simply stipulating that epistêmê is or includes knowledge of def­in­ itions, or that he started with a very specific and demanding conception of the abilities involved in epistêmê which entails that it must include know­ ledge of definitions.4 If we assume that Plato is working with the Basic Conception, we have a simpler explanation. The definitional requirement falls neatly out of the principle that epistêmê is of Being when coupled with a Socratic metaphysical view that the ontologically privileged things are essences. To have epistêmê about piety, for example, involves being in cognitive contact with the essence of piety. Very plausibly, Plato thinks that to be in such contact is to be in the kind of cognitive condition that can be expressed in a definition.5 3  Thus Geach: “We know heaps of things without being able to define the terms in which we express our knowledge” (1966, 371). 4  “The Priority of Definition principle . . . is not part and parcel of a ‘style of mistaken thinking’ about knowledge and definition [as widely thought], but a specific case of a general Platonic principle of epistemology: the principle that epistêmê requires a logos” (Prior 1998, 112). 5  Do we need a further substantive thesis about epistêmê to explain the claim that one must be able to give the definition? More economically, we can get this out of Plato’s other views. He seems to think that the ability to state one’s thoughts calls for no special explanation: in the Charmides, after saying that Charmides must have some opinion (doxa) about what temperance is, Socrates adds: “And since you speak Greek you can surely also state that which appears to you?” (κἂν εἴποις δήπου αὐτὸ ὅτι σοι φαίνεται) (Charmides 159a). Perhaps he is implicitly working with a view that will become explicit in the later dialogues: thoughts are silent logoi in the soul, which can be expressed out loud as uttered logoi (see Sophist 263e–4a and Theaetetus 190a, discussed in the next chapter: these dialogues identify silent logos as doxa, but in contexts

Epistêmê in the earlier dialogues  211 Second, the connection with Being can explain the Meno’s claim that epistêmê results from a “reasoning out of the cause [aitia]” (98a)—a claim that has reasonably led some interpreters to assimilate epistêmê here to understanding.6 I have already discussed the evidence for a similar interpretation of the Two Worlds dialogues (see Chapter 4.2), but it is worth making explicit how the connection between epistêmê and Being could explain the Meno’s claim as well. What is the cause that the slave must grasp in order to turn his true doxa about the square into epistêmê? Socrates does not make the answer explicit, but as we just saw above he identifies as essences as explanatory. Thus, very plausibly he has in mind the essences of geometrical entities—the nature of line, triangle, square, and so on.7 He is looking for explanations such as: squares can be doubled by using the diagonal as base because the essence of square is such-and-such. (If so, he is anticipating the idea Aristotle will make explicit in his own discussion of geometrical epistêmê: we come to have epistêmê of geometrical theorems when we can demonstrate how they are explained by the first principles of geometry, namely the essences of the basic shapes.)8 What is the cause that an inquirer into virtue must grasp in order to turn their true doxai about virtue into epistêmê? Again Socrates does not make it explicit, but very plausibly he has in mind precisely what he has shown Meno to be ignorant of: the essence of virtue, the answer to the “what is it” question. Virtue can be taught (if indeed it is teachable) because the essence of virtue is know­ ledge of the good (if indeed that is its essence). In the Two Worlds dialogues, the explanatory requirement on epistêmê falls out of the Basic Conception of epistêmê, together with a metaphysical view about the nature of Being: that Beings are causes (see Chapter 4.2). We have now seen that the same could be true of the Meno, for here too, to grasp epistêmê-conferring explanations is to grasp Being. One note before we leave the topic of explanation: the Meno’s view seems to be that someone who grasps a Being, and uses it to explain an onto­logic­al­ly where, I argue below, Plato is considering a broad view of doxa on which epistêmê is a species). Thus having epistêmê about x entails having a logos about the being of x in one’s soul, one that one can state in conversation. Alternatively, perhaps Plato is already working with an implicit version of the like-by-like view of cognition we see in the middle dialogues. The Being of x is something deep, clear, precise; thus the grasp of it—namely, epistêmê—must be similarly deep, clear and precise, and on the cognitive side those qualities manifest as the ability to state clearly what one grasps. 6  See especially Nehamas 1985 and Schwab 2015; I follow their interpretations closely here. 7  For defense of this interpretation see Gerson 2009, 30, and Schwab 2015. 8  See for example Posterior Analytics II.2–3; for discussion see among others Bronstein 2016.

212  Epistemology in the Earlier Dialogues derivative fact, thereby comes to have epistêmê of that ontologically derivative fact. With an explanatory account grounded in the essence of square, one who starts off with true doxa about how to double the area of a square can convert it into epistêmê (reading 85c–d with 98a). Presumably, although Socrates does not say so explicitly, the same holds in the case of virtue: with an explanatory account grounded in the nature of virtue, one who starts off with true doxa about virtue being teachable, or beneficial, can convert that into epistêmê. If this is right, then epistêmê is not restricted to Beings.9 Arguably Plato’s thought is that epistêmê requires a grasp of Being, but can then be extended to other things as well. (Someone with epistêmê of virtue’s Being can use this to get epistêmê of whether or not virtue is teach­able; someone with epistêmê of piety’s Being can use this to get epistêmê about whether or not particular actions are pious.10) If this is what Plato has in mind, it would constitute an important difference between his earlier and later epistemology, for in the Two Worlds dialogues, I have argued at length, epistêmê is exclusively of Being. Does this show that the Meno rejects Distinct Objects? And does it entail that in the earlier dialogues Being is not the defining object of epistêmê— that Plato sees an important connection between epistêmê and Being, but is not yet working with the Basic Conception on which epistêmê is to be understood, essentially, as cognition of Being? If so, then the explanatory accounts I have proposed above are misleading: although Plato could in principle derive epistêmê’s features from its connection with Being even in the earlier dialogues, that is not what he is doing. I postpone these questions until we have discussed the earlier dialogues’ view of doxa. For now, we have seen that these dialogues work with the principle that epistêmê is of Being, and that they characterize epistêmê in ways consistent with the idea that here too this principle constitutes the Basic Conception.

9  Perhaps Plato would be sympathetic to a view like Aristotle’s in the Posterior Analytics, on which there is a difference between cognition of the essences and of the derivative phenomena: one who has a specially excellent grasp of the first principles, what Aristotle calls nous, and who can demonstrate how these principles explain the derivative phenomena, thereby comes to have demonstrative epistêmê of the derivative phenomena. But Plato makes no such distinctions here, and it seems reasonable to attribute to him the view that epistêmê of Beings can yield epistêmê of the rest. 10  This is implied by Socrates’ question “How can I know what a thing is like when I don’t know at all what it is?” (Meno 71a); certainly Socrates is widely interpreted as holding that def­i n­itional epistêmê is prior to other epistêmê, rather than that other epistêmê is impossible.

Doxa in the earlier dialogues  213

2.  Doxa in the earlier dialogues The Socratic dialogues do not distinguish a realm of perceptible things that seem from a realm of intelligible Beings, nor do they systematically associate doxa with cognition of what seems. They do sometimes exploit the verbal connection between the subject and object senses of ‘doxa’: in the Crito, for example, the Laws tell Socrates that escape would confirm the jurors’ doxa of him, since one who destroys the laws would seem (doxeien) to destroy the youth as well (Crito 53b–c). But there is no emphasis on the in­fer­ior­ity of what seems, and there is no widespread use of ‘doxa’ to characterize an inferior cognitive condition, nor does any other term take its place.11 The Meno firmly establishes doxa as the inferior counterpart of epistêmê, but without any special emphasis on the connection with seeming. Nonetheless, these dialogues certainly present an inferior cognitive ­condition which has much in common with doxa as we have seen it in the Two Worlds dialogues, sometimes using vocabulary related to seeming. For example, lacking epistêmê and being influenced by how things appear (phainetai) or seem (dokei) means being cognitively unstable, “wandering” in how things seem to one (Hippias Minor 372d–e)12 or even in one’s doxa (Alcibiades1, 117a–b).13 Furthermore, the concerns that motivate the Two Worlds’ dialogues ­conception of doxa are evident here too. We saw some evidence in Chapter 8: the early dialogues draw an enormous amount of attention to an inferior cognitive condition in which people are focused on particular perceptible phenomena, unable to think beyond these to hidden unifying essences and causes. Plato suggests that this is the cognitive condition of ordinary people by showing that Socrates’ interlocutors tend not even to understand his definitional questions: they proffer lists of the many F things, or varieties of Fness, rather than a unifying essence. (See for example Euthyphro 6d, and 11  For example, the Apology draws attention to (a) the contrast between those who falsely seem (δοκεῖ) wise, to themselves and others, and those who really are (Apology 21c), and to (b) a corresponding contrast between those who suppose they are wise and those who actually know (οἴεταί τι εἰδέναι οὐκ εἰδώς, Apology 21d), but it does not use dokein or doxa to mark the second contrast, nor does it reserve the word it does choose, oiesthai, for the condition of being taken in by what seems: at 29b, Socrates supposes (οἴομαι) correctly that he does not know. 12  “Sometimes indeed the opposite of these things seems to me, and I wander about these things. It’s clear that this is because of not knowing [ἐνίοτε μέντοι καὶ τοὐναντίον δοκεῖ μοι τούτων και πλανῶμαι περὶ ταῦτα. δῆλον ὅτι διὰ τὸ μὴ εἰδέναι].” (Hippias Minor 372d–e). 13  “Whenever someone does not know [εἰδῇ], necessarily their soul wanders [πλανᾶσθαι] about this thing . . . And does your doxa wander about these things too [πλανᾶται σου ἡ δόξα] [viz., how to ascend to heaven]?” (Alcibiades I, 117b).

214  Epistemology in the Earlier Dialogues especially Hippias Major 287c–288a, quoted in Chapter 8.2.) And although Plato does not emphasize the point in these dialogues, we can certainly ­construe this condition as the condition of cognizing things only as they seem: in this mindset people focus on what is obvious and apparent (the particular perceptible phenomena), unaware of the underlying hidden deep truths. Moreover, I will argue in the Conclusion, these dialogues also treat ordinary people as dreamers, in one specific but all-important arena: they mistake things that merely seem good for things that really are good. These dialogues also emphasize another aspect of dreaming: many of Socrates’ interlocutors think they have epistêmê when they do not.

3.  Distinct Objects and objects-based epistemology in the earlier dialogues We have seen important resemblances between the epistemology of the earl­ier dialogues and that of the Two Worlds dialogues. But are the Basic Conceptions of doxa and epistêmê already present in the earlier dialogues, or only anticipated? One reason to doubt that Plato is already working with a full-blown objects-based epistemology is that the earlier dialogues seem not to subscribe to Distinct Objects. In the Meno, a person who lacks epistêmê can have “true doxa about those things which he does not know [peri toutôn hôn ouk oide]” (85c)—that is, about things which one could have epistêmê. Indeed, because a true doxa can be turned into epistêmê (when “tied down with a reasoning out of the cause” (98a)), it seems that the initial doxa and the resulting epistêmê will have the same subject matter: both will be about how to double the area of a square (85c–d), or about the road to Larissa (97a–b). These observations have motivated some to resist the Distinct Objects interpretation even of the Two Worlds dialogues, on the grounds that it would impute a radical inconsistency between these and the Meno (see especially Fine 1978 and 1990). I want here to show that the inconsistency is in fact neither so large nor so significant. First, there are some signs of a Distinct Objects view even in the earlier dialogues. Second, insofar as these dialogues support Overlap, the explanation is metaphysical. The epistemology at a general level remains constant, with epistêmê associated with Being and doxa with its inferior, readily apparent counterpart; the changes are driven by changes in Plato’s metaphysics.

Objects and Objects-Based Epistemology  215 Let us review the views we have found in the earlier dialogues about the objects of cognitive conditions. To begin with: (1) There is an ontological distinction between privileged Beings and derivative phenomena. (2) Epistêmê has a special relation to the Beings: without grasping Beings one cannot have epistêmê but will instead by consigned to an inferior cognitive condition, which Plato often calls doxa. Claims (1) and (2) are obviously shared with the Two Worlds dialogues. There is however an important difference in the metaphysics, with repercussions for the epistemology. In the earlier dialogues, Plato distinguishes but does not separate Beings from other things, for the essences or forms are in the ordinary things, making them be what they are. The nature of piety (for example) is in pious actions, making them pious. Thus claim (2) should be read as: epistêmê and doxa may have distinct objects, but not sep­ ar­ate ones. Epistêmê is of one aspect of piety—namely the essence—while doxa is about another aspect: particular instances or accidents of piety. If Plato does hold a Distinct Objects view here, it is one unlike what we see in the Two Worlds dialogues, and closer to what we saw in Aristotle (Chapter 1.4): epistêmê is of the unchanging essential features of things, doxa of their other features. Does Plato hold a Distinct Objects view in these dialogues though? A third claim from the earlier dialogues, which we saw above, may suggest that he does not: (3) Epistêmê of Being improves one’s cognition of the derivative phenomena. In this general form, claim (3) is shared with the Two Worlds dialogues too. As we saw in discussing the philosopher-rulers (Chapter 4.5), epistêmê of Forms improves one’s cognition of perceptibles. On the Two Worlds’ version, I argued, the claim is consistent with Distinct Objects: even philo­ sophers cannot have epistêmê of perceptibles, but only some other kind of enhanced cognition.14 The earlier dialogues however, as we saw in Section 1, 14  I argued that Plato might call this doxa, or might want to give it another name, such as practical wisdom.

216  Epistemology in the Earlier Dialogues may subscribe to a stronger version of (3): arguably here epistêmê of Being allows for epistêmê, nothing less, of the derivative phenomena. (One who has epistêmê of what virtue is will also have epistêmê of what is like, e.g. teachable; one who has epistêmê of the nature of squares will also have epistêmê of how to double a square.) In fact there is a possible Distinct Objects reading of the earlier dialogues consistent with this stronger version of (3)—or more precisely, a possible way to flesh out what Plato here leaves under-theorized. It turns on reading strongly into the Meno the notion of doxa as atheoretical cognition. The idea would be that the improved cognition, although it is epistêmê, is not in fact about the very same objects as the original inferior cognition was. In gaining epistêmê one shifts one’s attention from particular, perceptible instances or qualities to the universal features that underwrite them—the essences, and also whatever features these robustly explain. For example: the Meno’s slave has only true doxa about squares, even at the end of the mathematical discussion (85c–d), because his thoughts are about particular, perceptible squares. Just like Meno at the start of the dialogue, who does not yet grasp the idea that there is some Being of virtue, distinct from the many virtues—and just like the Republic’s sight-lovers and cave-dwellers—he has not yet turned his mind to Being. If he studies geometry further, he will start to get the idea that there is a single nature of the square itself, common to all squares; then, and only then, will he leave doxa behind. When he has grasped the nature of the square, and can use it to demonstrate a theorem about doubling the area of a square using the diagonal—that is, when he has tied down his true doxa with a reasoning out of the cause (98a)—he will replace his doxa with epistêmê.15 The resulting epistêmê will not be about particular perceptible squares (although it will of course inform our judgments about them). Instead it will be about the form of the square itself: about how the essence of squareness explains the various other features of squareness. There is, then, a viable Distinct Objects reading of the Meno. But I wholly grant that it is not an obvious one: here, unlike in the Two Worlds dialogues, Plato makes no clear effort to restrict the objects of each cognitive kind.

15  That is, when one ties down a true doxa (Meno 98a) one ceases to have doxa on this topic, for the resulting epistêmê is not a kind of doxa (just as in coming to have knowledge, one ceases to have an opinion, for knowledge is not a kind of opinion). For arguments that this is the Meno’s view, see Gerson 2009, 28–30; and Vogt 2012, 13–14.

Objects and Objects-Based Epistemology  217 This brings me to the crucial point: if in fact the earlier dialogues do not embrace Distinct Objects, while the Two Worlds dialogues do, this is not a puzzling inconsistency, but instead just what we should expect. In the Socratic dialogues there is no metaphysical doctrine of separation between forms or essences and the derivative items they explain. In the Two Worlds dialogues, Being occupies a realm of its own, separate from the ontologically inferior. As this ontological divide grows, so too does the epistemological one: access to Being no longer entails or involves access to the inferior. Moreover, in the earlier dialogues there is no suggestion that the derivative items are intrinsically unsuited to be objects of epistêmê. Socrates thinks that kinds or instances of virtue (for example) are varied and different, like bees (Meno 72b–c), but he never claims that they are so messy as to be beyond the reach of epistêmê, as we have seen him do in the Two Worlds dialogues (Chapter 4.4). Here then is a hypothesis. Right from the start Plato took it as a basic principle that epistêmê is primarily or specially of Being, and that there is a widespread inferior cognitive condition which fails to get at Being. Only however with the robust separation of Being from other things, things which were thereby downgraded, did he come to hold that epistêmê is only of Being: in the earlier dialogues, he held that Being is epistêmê’s primary and special object, but not its only one. Thus the earlier dialogues subscribe to a moderate Overlap view much like what some readers find in the Republic.16 So much for Distinct Objects in the earlier dialogues. What about the main subject of this book, objects-based epistemology? (Recall that a version of this is compatible even with a moderate Overlap reading like the one just proposed: cognitive kinds would be defined by their primary objects, just as on the strict version they are defined by their exclusive objects ­(Chapter 1.1)). Is Plato already working with full-blown objects-based Basic Conceptions of epistêmê and doxa, on which epistêmê’s relation to Being, and doxa’s to what seems, constitute the basic feature from which all others are derived? Or in the earlier dialogues are these simply important features of epistêmê and doxa, alongside others, without serving as fundamental unifying features?

16  See Harte 2018 and Kamtekar 2009, discussed in Chapter 1.1.

218  Epistemology in the Earlier Dialogues I find no strong evidence for full-blown objects-based conceptions in the earlier dialogues. We saw above that the Two Worlds dialogues explicitly ground features of cognitive kinds in features of their objects: for example, they ground the stability of epistêmê in the stability of Beings, and the ­instability of doxa in the instability of Becoming (see Chapters 4.3 and 7.3). In the Meno, by contrast, Socrates introduces the claim that epistêmê is ­stable and doxa unstable without argument, as if it were something that Meno will simply accept, and we are evidently meant to take this as a basic feature that needs no special explanation. I want to leave the question open, for what we have seen is compatible with both options. Perhaps the Basic Conceptions are at work already, and robustly explain Plato’s characterizations of epistêmê and doxa. Or, more plausibly, these conceptions are inchoate in these earlier dialogues, waiting for the full-blown metaphysics of the Two Worlds dialogues and with it the robust doctrine of objects-individuated and objects-defined cognition. In either case, we have seen that that the association between epistêmê and Being, and between doxa and the ontologically inferior or what seems, are present in and at least capable of doing explanatory work in the earlier dialogues’ epistemology. Here then is my proposal: although in the earlier dialogues Plato may not already be committed to the Basic Conceptions, his views in these dialogues are such that when he does come to a more explicit and developed epistemology, along with a more inflated metaphysics, these are the natural conceptions for him to adopt.

10

Epistemology in the Theaetetus A thorough study of Plato’s epistemology across the dialogues would require detailed interpretations of the later dialogues, but given this book’s focus on the Two Worlds dialogues, I will confine myself here to a brief study of the Theaetetus, with some comments on the Sophist and Philebus. (I have also discussed these dialogues at various points earlier in the book, noting that the Philebus, despite its presumed late date, is very much a Two Worlds dialogue). The Theaetetus obviously merits special attention here because its focus is epistêmê. On its surface, the epistemology of the dialogue appears to clash radically with that of the Two Worlds dialogues. Not only does the Theaetetus draw no association between epistêmê and Forms (which are indeed never explicitly mentioned), but it devotes extensive attention to the hypothesis that epistêmê is perception, and even after rejecting that hypoth­ esis gives frequent examples of epistêmê of perceptibles. Moreover, there is no attempt to distinguish epistêmê and doxa by their objects.1 Indeed the two are distinguished only minimally: the first hypothesis of the dialogue casually equates them (epistêmê is perception, where perception is equated with appearance and doxa (see below)), and the second and third hy­poth­ eses construe epistêmê as a kind of doxa: true doxa (187b), or true doxa with an account (201c–d). Nonetheless, I want to show, we can see the Basic Conceptions very much at work in the Theaetetus.

1  Indeed, it may seem that the dialogue rejects an objects-based conception of epistêmê at the outset, since Socrates rejects Theaetetus’ list-definition of knowledge (geometry, cobbling) on the grounds that it says what things epistêmê is of (τίνων) rather than what it is (146c–e). But Socrates’ principal objection to the proposed definition is that it enumerates the species of epistêmê rather than offering a unified definition; the complaint about objects comes in because the way to enumerate the species of epistêmê is to name various domains (e.g. “epistêmê of shoe-making”). Socrates’ objection to this is fully compatible with his holding that the correct definition is by way of the general object. (By analogy, someone might reject a definition of appetite by enumeration of its species—“thirst and hunger—that is, appetite for drink, appetite for food”—while holding that appetite is in fact to be defined by its generic object, as desire for the pleasant.) Plato’s Epistemology: Being and Seeming. Jessica Moss, Oxford University Press (2021). © Jessica Moss. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198867401.003.0011

220  Epistemology in the Theaetetus My discussion will be brief and sketchy, ignoring many interesting aspects of the dialogue’s epistemology and failing to engage extensively with others’ interpretations. I am not aiming to present a reading as being by all measures the best reading of this dialogue. Instead I aim to show that it can be read as consistent with the reading of Plato’s epistemology I have devel­ oped. In fact I think the reading I propose an attractive one on its own terms, but this is not the place to defend it against its many rivals. It is how­ ever worth noting that, despite some similarities, the interpretation I pro­ pose is not the one we find in Cornford 1935 and some Ancient interpreters on which the Theaetetus offers an implicit defense of the theory of Forms. My reading is consistent with this one, but also with the view that Plato has retained the basic tenets of his epistemology—epistêmê is of what Is, while doxa is of something distinct and inferior, what seems—while deflating his metaphysics, so that Being and seeming are no longer to be identified as the intelligible realm of Forms and the perceptible realm of Becoming. It will be clearest to proceed by considering Plato’s treatments of epistêmê and of doxa together, in each of the dialogue’s three sections in turn.

1.  Theaetetus’ first definition Despite its radically anti-Platonic premise, we can clearly find the main elem­ents of the Two Worlds’ dialogues’ epistemology in the first part of the dialogue. Theaetetus hypothesizes that epistêmê is perception. Socrates argues that Theaetetus’ hypothesis is equivalent to Protagoras’ Measure Doctrine, in the process equating perception with appearance and with doxa.2 He then argues that the hypothesis also entails Heraclitus’ flux ontology. In other words, Socrates takes thesis (1) to entail (2) and (3):3 (1) Epistêmê is no different from perception, i.e. from doxa. [Theaetetus] (2) Being is no different from what seems. [Protagoras] (3) Being is no different from Becoming. [Heraclitus] Why should these relations between the theses hold? There is a good deal of debate over how to understand Socrates’ surprising development of 2  I give evidence below. Compare Frede 1999. 3  For a more complex interpretation of the structure, see Burnyeat 1982.

Theaetetus ’ first definition  221 Theaetetus’ hypothesis. I will present an interpretation that makes sense of the argument by showing it to presuppose the main tenets of Plato’s objectsbased epistemology: epistêmê is of Being, doxa is of what seems, and cogni­ tive kinds are defined by their objects. To put it briefly, I propose that the entailments between theses (1)–(3) hold because epistêmê is of what Is, while doxa is of what seems, which is  identical to what becomes. If the cognitive conditions turn out to be ­identical—thesis (1)—then so too must be their objects (theses (2) and (3)). Now for some evidence, beginning with the connection between epistêmê and Being. As we saw in Chapter 3, in this portion of the dialogue Socrates treats the connection as obvious, common ground between all disputants. In developing Theaetetus’ hypothesis he states as an explicit assumption that “epistêmê is of what is” (152c) and in refuting the hypothesis he relies on the claim that epistêmê grasps being (186e).4 What does he mean by ‘what is’ and ‘being’? There is an enormous amount of interpretative contro­ versy over the meaning of these words in the refutation passage and its con­ text (184b–186e), which I will address in the next section. Much less attention has been paid to the question of what the words mean in the earl­ ier part of the dialogue, but it is obviously most charitable to think that the meaning is the same in both contexts. (See Chapter 3.1. The claim that epistêmê is of what is, or being, functions as a premise in both the develop­ ment and the refutation of Theaetetus’ hypothesis; if the meaning has changed, then the refutation misses its mark). What I want to show here is that whatever ‘what is’ and ‘being’ mean here, they play the same role that we have seen elsewhere: privileging certain things above others as onto­ logic­al­ly superior. Theaetetus states that epistêmê is perception; Socrates takes this to entail that as things are perceived by or appear or seem to each person, so they are for that person, i.e. are true.5 There is a clear conceptual contrast here between what is, or truth, and what seems: Protagoras’ radical view that the

4  See the texts discussed in Chapter 3.1 as expressing what I there called ASSUMPTION: “In matters of hot things and all things like that, as each person perceives things, so they are for that person . . . Perception therefore is always of what is [tou ontos], and without falsehood [apseudes], as befits epistêmê” (152c); “Perception has no share in grasping truth, since it has no [share in grasping] being [ousia], and therefore neither [has it any share in] epistêmê. And therefore perception is not the same as epistêmê” (186e). 5  See, in addition to the passages quoted just below: “As each thing appears to me, so it is for me [οἷα μὲν ἕκαστα ἐμοὶ φαίνεται, τοιαῦτα μὲν ἔστιν ἐμοί]” (152a); “as each person perceives things, such things also are for that person” (152c); “the things that seem are true for the per­ son to whom they seem [τὰ ἀεὶ δοκοῦντα . . . τῷ δοκοῦντι εἶναι ἀληθῆ]” (158e).

222  Epistemology in the Theaetetus two always converge indeed presupposes such a contrast. Indeed, we see appeals to this contrast throughout the discussion. For example, Protagoreans hold that: whatever seems [dokoun] on each occasion to each person this also is for the person to whom it seems;6 they wanted to hold this both in other cases and not least concerning just things, saying that more than anything ­whatever a city lays down as seeming [doxanta] [just] to it, these things also are just.  (177c–d emphases added; cf. 172b)

Moreover, Socrates presents as obstacles to the Protagorean view cases like dreams, hallucinations, and misperceptions, in which (according to com­ mon sense) “far from what appears [phainomena] to each person also being, quite the opposite: nothing that appears is” (158a, emphases added). Thus Socrates’ use of ‘being’ in this section of the dialogue is a contrast use, and the relevant contrast is one central to the argument of this book, the one we have seen to underlie Plato’s notion of seeming and his notion of doxa (see Chapter 6.3): (Contrast 5) What Is versus what seems (dokei). With some caution, I will thus use the capitalized ‘Being’ to mark this notion. I do not mean to say that Plato is here committing to a full-blown Two Worlds metaphysics on which the realm of Being is distinct from the realm of seeming: that would involve radically talking past Protagoras and Theaetetus. I simply mean that here too Plato is privileging one kind of thing by contrast with others, and marking it with the label ‘being.’ Furthermore, here too as with the other instances of this contrast we have seen, Being is marked out as the object of epistêmê. Why does Socrates take the hypothesis that epistêmê is perception to entail the Protagorean view that things are just as they seem or appear? Because epistêmê is of Being, while perception is of what seems, and therefore if epistêmê is perception, what Is and what seems completely coincide—Protagorean relativism holds. I will return in the next section to the interpretation of ‘being’ later in the dialogue. For now, we have seen that in the first part we have the familiar idea that epistêmê is of Being. Now let us consider how this first part of the dialogue treats doxa. We find Socrates drawing a casual but systematic—indeed almost 6  τὸ αἐὶ δοκοῦν ἑκάστῳ τοῦτο καὶ εἶναι τούτῳ ᾧ δοκεῖ.

Theaetetus ’ first definition  223 analytic—correlation between doxa and what seems, much as he does in the Two Worlds dialogues. As we just saw, he variously states Protagoras’ Measure Doctrine as the thesis that things are for each person as that per­ son perceives them to be, as they appear, or as they seem. He then moves without any argument to the claim that on this view each person’s doxa is of what is. We see this at 161c–d, where he moves from “what seems [to ­dokoun] to each person also is” to “whatever someone forms a doxa of ­[doxazêi] through perception is true,” and from there to “no one will be more authoritative in investigating whether another person’s doxa is true or false.”7 We also see it in the famous self-refutation argument, which equates the thesis that “what seems [to dokoun] to each person also is for the person to whom it seems” with the thesis that there is no false doxa (170a–c; cf. 179c). That doxa is of what seems or appears is treated as an obvious truth, in need of no emphasis nor argument. Finally, this part of the dialogue not only correlates epistêmê with Being and doxa with what seems, but implies a robust objects-based epistemology on which cognitive kinds are individuated and determined by their objects. This emerges in Socrates’ argument that Theaetetus’ epistemology entails Heraclitean metaphysics, on which all is such constant flux that “nothing ever is, but everything becomes”8, and hence all the things that we say are beings we should call becomings instead (152d–e). Why does Theaetetus’ view entail Heraclitus’? The argument makes sense if we take Socrates to hold that, given a lack of distinction between epistêmê and perception or doxa, and the ensuing lack of distinction between what Is and what seems, there can be no real distinction between Being and Becoming. The epis­ temo­logic­al distinction stands and falls with the ontological one. This is an argument that presupposes an objects-based, Distinct Objects epistemol­ ogy. Indeed it is very similar to an argument we have seen Timaeus make very compactly in drawing out a consequence of this kind of epistemology in the Timaeus (with the caveat, to be addressed below, that here Plato is talking about Forms): If then nous and true doxa are two different kinds [genê], then these things do by all means exist, themselves by themselves, the Forms that are 7  Compare 166e–167c, which equates the thesis that things are for each person as they appear, i.e. as they seem, with the thesis that as each person forms doxa (doxazein) of things so they are. “To the sick person the things he eats both appear and are bitter [φαίνεται . . . καὶ ἔστι] . . . It is impossible to form doxa about things that are not [i.e., whatever one forms a doxa about is] [οὔτε γὰρ τὰ μὴ ὄντα δυνατὸν δοξάσαι] . . . whatever seems just and fine to a city also is [δοκῇ . . . καὶ εἶναι].” 8  ἔστι μὲν γὰρ οὐδέποτ’ οὐδέν, ἀεὶ δὲ γίγνεται (152e).

224  Epistemology in the Theaetetus imperceptible to us and objects of nous only [nooumena]. If however, as it appears to some, true doxa and nous differ not at all, then whatever we perceive through the body must be assumed to be the most stable things there are.  (Timaeus 51d)

Here too, epistemological and ontological distinctions stand and fall together: if, and only if, epistêmê and true doxa are distinct, so too are Being and Becoming. If there is some cognitive condition superior to true doxa, there must also be some ontological entity superior to mere Becoming; if instead so-called epistêmê is nothing more than true doxa, then so-called Being is nothing more than Becoming.9 Collapse the epistemological dis­ tinction—as Theaetetus’ hypothesis does—and the ontological distinction collapses too. Why hold that the epistemological and ontological distinctions are mutu­ ally entailing? We know why Plato holds this view in the Timaeus: because epistêmê is exclusively of Being, and doxa exclusively of Becoming.10 Why hold the specific thesis about stability, that if there is no epistêmê distinct from true doxa then there is no stable Being? Again, we know why Plato holds this view in the Two Worlds dialogues: because epistêmê inherits its stability from its objects; the existence of a stable cognitive condition depends on the existence of stable objects like Forms. And we can see the same principles at work in Socrates’ argument from Theaetetus’ epistemology to Heraclitus’ metaphysics. We might paraphrase his thinking as follows: (P1)  Epistêmê is of Being, obviously. We normally think of epistêmê as stable, and of being stable because Being is stable—since, as you know, I hold: (P2)  Cognitive kinds inherit their qualities from their objects. But now you, Theaetetus, are proposing that epistêmê is unstable: conflicting, changeable, varying with varying appearances. In short, you’re reducing epistêmê to doxa. Well then: 9  That is the meaning of the last phrase: to say that perceptibles are the most stable things there are is to say that there are no genuinely stable items, and hence, given Plato’s metaphysics, no Beings. 10  Compare an argument one might make about the paradigm object-individuated powers of Republic V: “If sight and hearing really are two different kinds, then colors do exist, distinct from hearing. But if sight and hearing do not differ at all [i.e. if ‘sight’ is just a misleading name for hearing, according to some strange proposal], sounds are all there is. Sight is different from hearing if and only if color is different from sound.” Why would someone hold this view? Because they think sight is by nature of color, and is individuated as a sense—counts as a sense distinct from hearing and the others—for that very reason.

Refuting Theaetetus  225 (P3) If epistêmê is unstable, then by P1 and P2, Being must be unstable too. But that’s just another way to say that: (C)  There really isn’t any Being as we ordinarily think of it, only Becoming: you’re reducing Being to Becoming, like Heraclitus. Finally, before leaving this section of the dialogue, a comment on the notion of Being. I have been comparing the Theaetetus’ argument to the Timaeus’, but I do not mean to suggest that Socrates here follows Timaeus in identify­ ing the Beings as Forms. As we saw above, when Socrates introduces the claim that epistêmê is of what is (152c), the claim is meant to be obvious and acceptable to his interlocutors, Theaetetus and the imagined Protagoras. It would be radically slippery of Socrates to be appealing here to Forms. Nonetheless, he is still picking out the ontologically superior, i.e. something privileged over and contrasted with other things and marked with the label ‘being’: what Is by contrast with what appears (152a—Contrast 5); or in the next lines by contrast with what becomes (152d—Contrast 2 from Chapter 3). Of course the reader may suspect that what Socrates has in mind are those paramount non-seeming, non-becoming entities from the Two Worlds dialogues, the Forms. But his interlocutors can hear the claim very differently. On the surface, Socrates is simply appealing to the ordinary con­ trasts between how things are and how they appear, and between things that stably remain the same and things that change, contrasts that underlie the commonsense notion of stable, mind-independent reality, a notion with which Protagoras and Heraclitus are perfectly familiar. At 152c, Protagoras can go along with the argument, thinking “Yes Socrates, of course I agree with you that epistêmê is of what really is, not what merely seems to be. Most people think that means that going with how things seem is not enough for epistêmê. But I argue that how things seem is how they really are. And therefore going with how things seem—that is, perceiving—simply is epistêmê.” So we can read this part of the dialogue as surreptitiously assuming a Two Worlds metaphysics, or as studiously remaining innocent of it. In either case, I hope to have shown that it presupposes an objectsbased epistemology on which epistêmê is of what Is, and doxa of what seems.

2.  Refuting Theaetetus After refuting Heraclitus’ view and Protagoras’, Socrates turns to a direct refutation of the thesis that epistêmê is perception, in an argument

226  Epistemology in the Theaetetus I discussed briefly in Chapter 3. Perception grasps only proper perceptibles like color and sound, and cannot grasp any of the “common” features of objects, including being (184b–186b). Therefore: Perception has no share in grasping truth, since it has no [share in grasping] being [ousia], and therefore neither [has it any share in] epistêmê. And therefore perception is not the same as epistêmê. (186e)

As before, being is the special province of epistêmê. But what does Plato have in mind? There is an entire body of literature debating the meaning of ‘being’ in this part of the dialogue. Is Socrates referring to Forms? To essences? To objective reality? Or is he using ‘being’ as the copula, so the claim is that perception cannot make predications?11 Once again, we do not need to settle this question to show that ‘being’ has the function of picking out the ontologically superior. The argument that perception has no share in being rests on a metaphysical distinction, yet another contrast between something labeled ‘being’ and something lesser: (Contrast 8) The Being of Fness (or of F things?) versus perceptible Fness. (Theaetetus 186b–c)12 Whatever ‘being’ means here, Plato is drawing a distinction between or­din­ ary things accessible to ordinary cognition (the hardness that we can touch) and their Being, accessible only through special intellectual effort (the soul has to “go back and compare in relation to one another, and try to ­discern. . . . [using] calculations [analogismata]”(186b–c))—just as he does in the Socratic and Two Worlds dialogues. The hardness we perceive is not, in the strict sense, what Is. So whatever precisely Socrates has in mind by ‘being’ here, he is once again privileging one kind of thing above others, and marking it out with the label “being.” Moreover, he is once again arguing that this special kind of thing is the object of epistêmê. In other words, 11  Some representative interpretations: Burnyeat  1976 (copula), Cornford  1935 (Forms), Cooper 1970 (objective reality), Modrak 1981 (essences). 12  “Don’t we perceive the hardness of the hard [thing] through touch, and the softness of the soft likewise?—Yes—But the being and that they are [τὴν δέ γε οὐσίαν καὶ ὅτι ἐστὸν], and the opposition in relation to one another and the being in turn of this opposition, the soul itself going back and comparing in relation to one another tries to discern for us.—Certainly.—Then surely the affections that reach the soul through the body are present to humans and beasts as soon as we are born, while the calculations about these things, regarding both being and bene­ fit, scarcely arrive to those to whom they do arrive even after a long time, and through a lot of effort and education” (Theaetetus 186b–c).

Theaetetus ’ second definition: two senses of doxa?  227 epistêmê is correlated with the ontologically superior—even if that is here a less robust notion than what we saw in the Two Worlds dialogues. This I think rules out the straightforward version of the copula reading, but it allows all the others that have been proposed.13

3.  Theaetetus’ second definition: two senses of doxa? The upshot of the refutation is that epistêmê is not perception, because per­ ception does not grasp Being. Given the first part of the dialogue’s casual equivalences between doxa and perception, we would expect Socrates also to conclude that epistêmê is not doxa, but here the dialogue takes a surpris­ ing turn. Theaetetus, with Socrates’ approval, identifies the soul’s activity of investigating Being as forming doxa (doxazein), and then offers a second definition: epistêmê is true doxa. What has happened? The Basic Conception of epistêmê is still in place: epistêmê is of Being. But what about doxa? Unlike in the Two Worlds dia­ logues, it is no longer an inferior kind of cognition consigned to an inferior realm, but something that can itself attain truth and Being. And unlike in the Two Worlds dialogues, it is not something contrasted with epistêmê, but rather a genus of which epistêmê is a special species. It is the familiar con­ ception of doxa as inferior cognition that seems to be at play in the first part of the dialogue, as strongly suggested both by the close connection with appearance and perception, and by the fact that the Protagorean equation of doxa with epistêmê is presented as radical. Why have things changed now? The most plausible interpretation is that Plato is not revising his old view of doxa, but instead, while leaving that intact, pressing the word ‘doxa’ into service to do another task as well: to refer to something for which he has no other term, namely the generic condition of judging or taking-to-be-true— what modern epistemologists call belief. That he really has changed the topic is strongly suggested by the characterization he goes on to give of doxa: The soul when it thinks [dianooumenê] is doing nothing other than dia­ loguing, asking itself questions and answering them, and affirming and 13  If we assimilate the copula reading to the objective-reality reading—grasping that the white is sweet (for example) means grasping that it really is the case that the white is sweet, i.e. the white really, objectively is sweet—then this reading fits too. Of course that is a departure from what Burnyeat and followers propose, but it is one that makes the copula reading a much better fit with the use of ‘being’ in the first part of the dialogue, and is moreover plausible on its own terms, I would argue: see Moss 2014.

228  Epistemology in the Theaetetus denying. And whenever it has determined something, either gradually or by leaping quickly, and affirms the same thing and does not disagree, we put that down as its doxa. So I call forming a doxa ‘saying’ [to doxazein legein], and I call doxa a logos spoken not to another nor with voice, but silently to oneself.  (Theaetetus 189e–190a)

Contrast the closest thing we get to a definition of doxa in the Republic: dreaming, mistaking a likeness for the thing it is like (476c–d). It is very hard to see these as two different descriptions of the same phenomenon. What we have here in the Theaetetus looks like a description not of cogni­ tively deficient dreaming, but instead of generic belief-formation. The description is broad and neutral: it seems to apply not only to appearancebased beliefs like the dreamings of the Republic, or to the doxai discussed earlier in the Theaetetus, but also to the most reflective, precise beliefs about hidden underlying truths: epistêmê. I am thus inclined to agree with those who have argued that Plato’s use of ‘doxa’ at this point simply becomes ambiguous (see especially Vogt  2012, 84, and Sprute 1962). Earlier (in the Meno and Two Worlds dialogues), doxa was negatively characterized as inferior—unclear, unstable—while there is nothing negative in the present characterization. Earlier, doxa was con­ trasted with epistêmê; now doxa is instead its genus. It is no accident that while in other contexts Plato’s use invited the translation ‘opinion,’ here it invites the translation ‘judgment.’14 Nor is this a one-off usage: the Sophist gives an account of doxa as silent affirmation or denial (263e–264a), very like what we see at Theaetetus 189e–190a. The Philebus is a harder case. It offers something similar, but with a restriction to thoughts arising from perception (38b–39a): one begins from a perceptual appearance that x is F, and then after an inner dialogue asserts that it is F or is not. This implies a view of doxa closer to what we find in the Two Worlds dialogues—and thus fits well with the decidedly Distinct Objects treatment of doxa and epistêmê at Philebus 58c–59d. On the other hand, the Philebus does show a more positive assessment of doxa than some dialogues: true doxa is grouped with epistêmê and nous in the class that forms Socrates’ candidate for the good (21b; cf. 11b). Perhaps Plato here holds a view of doxa which is somehow hybrid of the other two. Or perhaps—a suggestion to which I will return below—the Philebus view is 14  See among many others the translation by Levett, with Burnyeat’s commentary (1990); even Cornford opts for ‘judgment’ at this juncture (1935).

Theaetetus ’ second definition: two senses of doxa?  229 the standard for these later dialogues: even here in the Theaetetus Plato means to restrict doxa to judgments that begin from appearances, which ­signals that the attempt to define epistêmê as a kind of doxa will fail. Suppose however that Plato’s use of ‘doxa’ is indeed ambiguous—that he here introduces a new use of the word to denote generic belief. If we assume that he is working throughout with the Basic Conception, the ambiguity is not arbitrary, because the notion of what seems is similarly ambiguous. As we have seen at length, Plato often sharply contrasts how things seem with how things are. But ‘dokein,’ just like our ‘seem,’ can also be quite neutral. Correspondingly, ‘dokei moi’ (literally “it seems to me”) can simply mean “This is my impression, this is how things appear to me,” with emphasis not on any contrast with reality, but instead on the subjectivity of the report: I am telling you my take on the situation. This latter use fits very well with the use of doxa to mean something like generic judgment or belief: one thinks through a question, and the conclusion one draws—how things now seem to one, on reflection—is one’s doxa.15 It is of course confusing to use the word in both ways, especially within the same dialogue—and especially in dialogues like the Theaetetus and Sophist, which in other contexts draw enormous attention to the contrast between seeming and being. Arguably when in the Sophist Plato introduces a new term, ‘phantasia,’ he is trying to disambiguate: now ‘phantasia’ takes on the task of referring to cognition of what merely seems (Grönroos 2013),16 leaving ‘doxa’ to denote generic judgment alone. In other work, with Whitney Schwab, I argue that Aristotle resolves the ambiguity in a different direction, keeping ‘doxa’ for the inferior kind of cognition and introducing a new term, ‘hupolêpsis,’ for generic belief (Moss and Schwab 2019). At any rate, we can see the Basic Conception at work on both sides of the alleged ambiguity: it underlies both the characterization of doxa in the first part of the dialogue, as equivalent to perceiving or being-appeared-to, and the new account of doxa in the remainder of the dialogue, as judgment or generic belief. Plato retains the platitude that doxa is of how things seem, developing it in two different ways.

15  There are other explanations for why Plato would choose ‘doxa’ as his label for this kind of cognition. Perhaps he is picking up on the older root of dokein in dechesthai, to accept: one considers a proposition, and then it becomes one’s doxa once one accepts or approves it. I am grateful to Alex Mourelatos and Paul Woodruff for discussion of this point. 16  Although Grönroos argues that ‘doxa’ now comes to denote not generic judgment, but a superior species thereof, namely a grasp of essences.

230  Epistemology in the Theaetetus

4. Theaetetus’ third definition The final section of the Theaetetus rejects the identity of epistêmê and true doxa, but not on the sort of grounds a reader of the Republic would expect. There is no claim that they are incompatible with one another, let alone that they have different provinces; the claim is instead that one needs to add something to true doxa—namely an account (logos)—to get epistêmê. It is no surprise that this discussion is so widely interpreted as developing a Justified True Belief account of knowledge:17 Plato seems to be treating doxa as generic belief or judgment, implying that epistêmê and doxa can have the same subject matter, and distinguishing epistêmê from other true doxai by some extra hold it has on the truth. One natural conclusion to draw is that Plato is now, late in his career, inventing a new kind of epistemology: he has finally hit on the topics of knowledge and belief. That may be right. On the other hand, there are plenty of signs—as many interpreters have noted—that even here he is working with a very different conception of epistemology, one much closer to that of the Two Worlds dialogues. I will make the case very briefly, reviewing some points that others have made and adding some new ones. First, the attempt to define epistêmê as true doxa with a logos fails: Socrates and Theaetetus are unable to come up with an adequate account of logos, and the dialogue ends in aporia. A natural interpretation (defended recently in Sedley  2004) is that Plato is rejecting the entire enterprise of defining epistêmê as a kind of true doxa: as in the Two Worlds dialogues, he thinks epistêmê and doxa exclude one another; even accompanied by the very best accounts, a true doxa will never be more than doxa. Second, there are signs that the attempt fails precisely because Plato still wants to distinguish epistêmê and doxa by their objects. On a traditional interpretation, the Theaetetus is Plato’s reductio of epistemology without the Forms: as the Anonymous Commentator puts this interpretation (which he rejects), “having proposed to investigate epistêmê, in the Theaetetus [Plato] shows what it is not about [peri], while in the Sophist he shows what it is about”—viz., Forms.18 Ancient interpreters also interpreted the dialogue as 17  Indeed by Gettier himself in arguing against such an account (Gettier, 1963, 121 n.1). 18  2.34–9. Sedley 1996 attributes the view to the Didaskalikos; it was revived in the last cen­ tury by Cornford: “The Platonist will draw the necessary inference. True knowledge has for its objects things of a different order—not sensible things, but intelligible Forms and the truths about them . . . The Theaetetus leads to this old conclusion by demonstrating the failure of all attempts to extract knowledge from sensible objects” (1935, 162–3).

Theaetetus ’ third definition  231 confining doxa to perceptibles. Rather than taking the arguments ­distinguishing doxa from perception (at 184b–187a) to show that doxa is generic belief, they took them to show that doxa makes judgments about perceptibles: judgments that go beyond what perception itself can do, but that are still confined to perceptible objects.19 Even if we reject these particular readings, here is an argument—­ admittedly a highly speculative one—that the argument refuting the second hypothesis turns on the idea that epistêmê is of Being, and doxa of what seems. Socrates begins as follows: There is a whole craft showing you that [true doxa] is not epistêmê . . . the profession of those greatest in wisdom, those called orators and lawyers. For they persuade, using their craft, not teaching people but making them have doxa [doxazein poiountes] of whatever they want . . . And don’t you mean by ‘persuading someone’ making them form a doxa [doxasai]? (Theaetetus 201a–b)

The idea that rhetoric persuades by producing doxa, rather than teaches by producing epistêmê, is one we discussed in Chapters 6.3 and 7.4. There we saw that Plato tends to explain this feature of rhetoric with another: orators present what seems rather than what really Is (see Phaedrus 260a–c, 261c–d, Sophist 234c–d). Could he have the same thought in mind here? Consider how the argument continues: So surely whenever the jurors have been justly persuaded about things which can be known only by someone who sees them [idonti monon estin eidenai], and not in any other way, and they judge from hearsay [ex akoês], acquiring true doxa, they have judged without epistêmê, but are correctly persuaded, if they juried well?  (Theaetetus 201b–c, emphases added)

Why could only an eye-witness have epistêmê about a crime? This claim, reminiscent of the Meno’s claim that the person who knows the road to

19  See Chapter 1.3. They found evidence in the distinction between proper perceptibles as the province of perception, and commons—where commons are still features of perceptible objects—as the province of doxa: Proclus defines doxa as cognition of the essences of percepti­ bles. They also found evidence in the wax block model, where doxa results from matching a memory of something formerly perceived with an occurrent perception (Theaetetus 191c–195a): the Didaskalikos, presumably drawing also on the Philebus, takes this to show that “doxa is a combination of memory and perception” (Didaskalikos 4.5).

232  Epistemology in the Theaetetus Larissa is the one who has walked it himself (97a–b), seems to suggests that epistêmê requires direct experience of its objects. On a once-prevalent inter­ pretation, Plato took epistêmê to be “knowledge by acquaintance,” and ignored the possibility of “knowledge by description,” or got confused between them (see especially Cross and Woozley, 1964, 171–78). But why would Plato, who even in the Theaetetus so elevates the epistemic role of reasoning, and so downgrades the epistemic role of perception, think per­ ceptual contact with an object more epistemically valuable than an accurate account of it?20 Perhaps instead the claim is something specially connected to rhetoric: indeed, that courtroom testimony can yield only doxa, not epistêmê, was a staple of contemporary rhetoric.21 Perhaps then Plato is appealing to his characterization of rhetoric as persuading by presenting what seems. The orator produces doxa because he can only ever present an image or reputation of the crime, even if a veridical one, not the thing itself. Witnessing the crime oneself is a metaphor for being in touch with things as they really Are. Thus the argument distinguishing epistêmê from true doxa appeals to a version of Distinct Objects: epistêmê is of the thing itself (e.g. the crime itself, what it Is), while doxa is of the appearance or reputation (the lawyer’s report, the crime as it seems to those not in touch with the thing itself). If so, then doxa is not after all generic belief, but something narrower: belief based on how things appear. We should revise our interpretation of doxa in the dialogue’s second and third hypotheses: the apparently new use and definition were never meant to widen doxa’s scope beyond the realm of seeming. Moreover, if this reading of the jury passage is right, then the definition of epistêmê as true doxa fails because epistêmê has a special object which is beyond the reach of doxa: Being. This would suggest that the third def­in­ ition, true doxa with a logos, has the task of capturing precisely this feature, and in fact we see some evidence that it does. Socrates explains the idea that the relevant logos is a list of a thing’s parts (the second account of logos) as follows: The person who is able to recount the being [ousian] of the wagon by going through those one hundred parts has by this addition added logos to 20  Others argue that the experience of walking the road is a metaphor for the intellectual labor of working out the explanation for oneself: see for example Fine 2004. 21  See for example Antisthenes’ Ajax 1.1–1.8 and Isocrates’ Antidosis 52–4.

Epistemology beyond the Two Worlds Dialogues  233 their true doxa, and instead of having doxa has become an expert and has epistêmê of the being of the wagon.22 (Theaetetus 207b–c)

When Socrates rejects this account, it is on the grounds that being able to list the parts is not sufficient for having a good grasp on them; the ­suggestion that epistêmê requires grasping the being is left untouched. Moreover, this characterization of epistêmê-conferring logos has a good Platonic p ­ edigree: see especially Republic 534b, where only the dialectician has nous, because only they “grasp the account of the Being of each thing” (ton logon . . . tês ousias).23 The third account of logos, as naming a thing’s distinguishing mark, seems to move in a different direction, but its failure could be taken as a sign that the right answer has been touched on and then aban­ doned: the person with epistêmê is the one who can give a logos of a thing’s Being. My discussion of the Theaetetus’ epistemology has been brief, and has left out many important details. I hope however to have shown in broad out­ lines that there is a compelling reading of the dialogue on which Plato retains an objects-based epistemology (in developing Theaetetus’ first def­in­ ition), retains the Basic Conception of epistêmê, and either expands the Basic Conception of doxa, or retains it throughout while also using ‘doxa’ to introduce a new notion: generic belief.

5.  Epistemology beyond the Two Worlds Dialogues In the Two Worlds dialogues, Plato puts forth full-blown objects-based con­ ceptions of his two main cognitive kinds. In this chapter and the previous, I have argued that we can trace these conceptions to truisms he works with and concerns he holds in the earlier dialogues, and that we can see them very much at work in his late treatise on epistemology, the Theaetetus. While—just as we should expect—Plato’s objects-based epistemology is at its most developed in the dialogues which most develop the metaphysical divide on which it is premised, it is anticipated earlier and survives later, and it serves as a useful lens through which to interpret Plato’s epistemology as a whole. 22  ἀντὶ δοξαστικοῦ τεχνικόν τε καὶ ἐπιστήμονα περὶ ἁμάξης οὐσίας γεγονέναι. 23 Compare Gorgias 501a, where crafts are epistemically superior to knacks because they can give a logos of the nature (phusis) and the cause of their objects.

Conclusion Plato’s Ethical-cum-Metaphysical Epistemology

What is Plato doing when he talks about epistêmê and doxa? I hope to have shown conclusively that he is doing something very different from what epistemologists do today. First, his central epistemological categories are very different from ours. His epistemology is centered around the contrast between a deep grasp of ultimate reality and atheoretical thought that mistakes appearances for reality. These are notions at best marginal to epistemology today. Perhaps we can trace important continuities between these notions and our con­tem­por­ ary notions of knowledge and belief; conceivably these continuities are strong enough that there is an interesting case to be made that Plato shares our epistemological concepts, while presenting different substantive the­or­ ies about them.1 Even if this project is successful, however, the differences between Plato’s notions and ours are profound. Second, his entire approach to epistemology is radically different from ours. His epistemology is objects-based, and hence dependent on metaphysics; ours is focused instead on notions like justification, evidence, rationality—purely epistemological notions, we might say—with little or no attention to the question of cognition’s objects. Indeed, Plato would think most of what goes on in epistemology today badly misguided, because it ignores metaphysics. Most obviously, he would consider most of our contrasts between knowledge and belief as merely contrasts between different kinds of doxa. Consider once again the claim in the Timaeus that a robust distinction between nous and doxa entails a corresponding ontological distinction between Being and becoming: If then nous and true doxa are two different kinds, then these things do by all means exist, themselves by themselves, the Forms that are im­per­cept­ible 1  See the suggestions in Chapter 5.4 and 8.4.

Plato’s Epistemology: Being and Seeming. Jessica Moss, Oxford University Press (2021). © Jessica Moss. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198867401.003.0012

Conclusion  235 to us and objects of nous only. If however, as it appears to some, true doxa and nous differ not at all, then whatever we perceive through the body must be assumed to be the most stable things there are.  (Timaeus 51d)

Without a Two Worlds metaphysics, Plato would think, we are not entitled to a two-kinds epistemology; we are just drawing fine distinctions between fundamentally shoddy cognitive phenomena. Others have seen that Plato’s epistemology is bound up with his metaphysics. What has not been fully enough nor widely enough appreciated, however, is just how significant this fact is for understanding what his ­epis­temo­logic­al categories are—and how radically different they are from ours. Knowledge and belief are object-neutral phenomena: one can have them about any kind of thing whatsoever. This means that knowledge and belief can be defined and understood independently of their objects and, therefore, largely independent of ontology. Of course, one’s ontology will influence one’s substantive epistemological views: for example, if you think that there is no external world you will think that very many of our beliefs are false. But even an ontological view as radical as this has no bearing on one’s views about what knowledge or belief are. Indeed, the only way that con­tem­por­ary epistemology conceptually presupposes ontology is through the widespread view that knowledge and belief are propositional attitudes. If you share this view, and take it to be a substantive one, then you would seem to be committed to the existence of propositions. You also think that it is an essential feature of knowledge that it is an attitude only to true ­propositions; perhaps you think it is an essential feature of belief that it is an ­attitude towards all sorts of propositions. There is certainly some analogy here to the epistemology I am attributing to Plato, but it is a fairly loose one; moreover, the propositions one knows or believes can be about any objects whatsoever. Plato’s epistemology, I have argued, is dependent on ontology in a much more fundamental way. His very distinction between epistêmê and doxa, at least at its most developed, entails an ontology which distinguishes Beings from ontologically inferior but apparent things. This means that, despite plenty of interesting and important similarities, Plato’s epistêmê and doxa are radically different from knowledge and belief as we understand these today. My main concern in the book has been to show that Plato’s epistemology is fundamentally different from ours in this way, and to investigate—once

236 Conclusion freed of the constraints imposed when we try to read him through our own views—just how his epistemology works. Recognizing the differences will however raise an important question: why would Plato do epistemology his way? Knowledge and belief, understood more or less as philosophers understand them now, are salient and important phenomena, obviously worthy of study; why devote so much attention instead to obscure or possibly empty notions like the deep grasp of ultimate reality, or atheoretical “dreaming”? Likewise, the contemporary project of investigating epistemological phenomena in their own right is one we can make sense of; why see them instead as fundamentally defined by objects? In this final chapter I will try to show that given Plato’s overarching philo­ soph­ic­al concerns and projects, his way of doing epistemology makes excellent sense—so much so that even without the detailed studies we have made, we could predict that his central epistemological categories and approach would be what I have argued that they in fact are. I am returning to the big picture I sketched briefly in the Introduction, filling it out a bit with textual evidence and indicating how the arguments of this book have supported it. It is widely recognized that Plato’s philosophy is largely driven by ethical concerns, and in particular by an overarching ethical question we see at work throughout the dialogues: How should one live? (For example: Republic 352d, Gorgias 500c, Apology 28b.) It is also widely recognized that his epistemology has a role in his answer to this question: the best life includes epi­ stem­ic excellence as a crucial ingredient. (Consider the Socratic dialogues’ equation of epistemic excellence with virtue, which is in turn constitutive of or at least absolutely necessary for happiness,2 or the Republic’s depiction of the life of the philosopher as the happiest.) I propose that this ethical role for epistemology is the key to understanding it. Plato’s epistemology is not first and foremost driven by purely epis­ temo­logic­al concerns, such as cataloguing our truth-apt mental states, or responding to skepticism, or analyzing current epistemological concepts. It is driven instead by ethical concerns. That is, the cognitive kinds and qual­ ities that are salient to Plato are precisely those that feature importantly in the answer to the question of how one should live. It is no accident that

2 See for example Laches 199d, Charmides 174c, Euthydemus 280b–282b, and Meno 87d–89a. There is a debate about the exact relation of virtue to eudaimonia on Socrates’ view (for one compelling interpretation see Vlastos 1984); all parties agree however that virtue, and thereby epistêmê, plays a crucial role in living well.

Conclusion  237 epistêmê tends to enter the scene in clearly ethical contexts: in earlier ­dialogues, as a candidate for being virtue; in the Republic, as a necessary condition for ruling city or soul well, and hence for virtue and happiness (428c–d); in the Philebus, as a candidate for the human good (11b); even in the Theaetetus, widely regarded as a work of epistemology in the modern vein, as a virtue (epistêmê is equated with wisdom (sophia) (145e), which is a virtue (145b)). The questions that motivate Plato’s concern to identify and define epistêmê, to distinguish it from doxa, and to exhort us to aspire to it, are primarily questions about what the best life is and how to achieve it. How does this explain the distinctive features of his epistemology? I will paint an answer in broad brush, since the central claims are familiar and fairly uncontroversial, and my main task is to show how they fit together to make sense of the account I have offered in this book of Plato’s epistemology. Although Plato’s answer to the ethical question of how one should live seems to vary over the course of the dialogues, we can identify some central common themes. First: there are certain things which are genuinely, objectively, really good, and the goal of life is or involves being related in the right way to what is really good. Second: there is a salient danger of wasting one’s life and harming oneself by pursuing what merely seems good instead. Third: therefore the key to achieving the goal—at the very least, a necessary condition—is being right about what is really good. The nature of desire is such that our desires push us toward whatever it is that we think good.3 What determines whether or not we pursue what is really good is therefore whether or not we are correct about what is good, i.e. whether or not we are able to detect what is really good by contrast with what seems so (see especially Meno 77a–78a, Protagoras 358b–d, and Republic 505a–e.)4 3  There are vexed questions about how this works, but they do not bear on our question here and so I set them aside. For example, what is the relation between Socrates’ claims that we desire what is really good, and his claims that we desire what appears good? (For discussion see. Barney 2010.) Is only rational desire for the good or seeming good, or are non-rational desires like appetites and spirited desires also for what seems good to those parts of the soul? (For defense of the latter answer see Moss 2008). 4  If we do not know (ἴσμεν, ἐπισταίμεθα) the Good itself, no other good can benefit us; pleasure seems (δοκεῖ) good to the many, and wisdom to the refined; no-one is satisfied to attain the seeming (δοκοῦντα) goods, but only the real things (ὄντα), so no-one values the doxa (Republic 505a–e). (Perhaps in the Republic and other dialogues which countenance nonrational desires there is also a second crucial factor: that the rational part of the soul be free to pursue what it thinks good. But this condition seems to be inseparable from the epistemic one:

238 Conclusion With this ethical picture in mind, when Plato turns to consider e­pis­temo­logic­al phenomena the distinction most salient to him will be between the cognitive condition that allows for a successful grasp of real goods and the cognitive condition responsible for a misguided attachment to seeming goods. Thus the cognitive condition he singles out as that to which we should aspire is that of being in touch with what really is. The cognitive condition he singles out as a danger is that of confining attention to what seems. We see this big picture in the Socratic dialogues. Socrates thinks most people are wrong about what is good: they pursue wealth, honor, pleasure, and power, wrongly thinking these will make them happy (see for example Apology 29d–30b, Gorgias 467a). What is really good is what Socrates exhorts us to pursue: wisdom and virtue.5 The biggest obstacle to pursuing these goods, meanwhile, is the failure to recognize them as such. This prevents one from recognizing that one does not already possess what is good, and therefore leaves one content with the sham goods one thinks real. Most people waste their time pursuing things that, if good at all, are only good for those who also have virtue (Apology 30b, Meno 87d–89a), failing to recognize the supreme value of virtue. Moreover, because they think they already have or are pursuing what is good, they are not motivated to pursue virtue: this is the condition Socrates warns against so emphatically in the Apology, and elsewhere too, of failing to recognize one’s own ignorance. In other words, the biggest obstacle to pursuing the good is the false seeming that one has already achieved it: This is what is so hard about ignorance: while not being [onta] fine and good nor wise, seeming [dokein] adequate to oneself. For the one who does not think themselves lacking will not desire that which they do not think they need.  (Symposium 204a)6 as the Republic’s discussion of degenerate souls shows, those whose rational parts are enslaved tend to have false conceptions of the good.) 5  For example, “We must treat as most important not life, but the good life. . . and the good life, the fine life and the just life are the same” (Crito 48b); “Aren’t you ashamed that you care for money, that you may have as much as possible, and care for your reputation and honor, but neither care for nor think of wisdom, truth, or your soul, that it may be as good as possible?” (Apology 29d–e). See also the arguments that wisdom, i.e. virtue, is the unconditional good which renders other things valuable (Meno 87d–89a, Euthydemus 280b–282b). 6  See also Socrates’ injunction to the jury: they should value his exhortations to wisdom and virtue far above the gratifications provided by an Olympic victor, for “that person makes you seem happy, while I make you be happy” (Apology 36d).

Conclusion  239 This entails that the cognitive condition of being right about what is good is a necessary condition for happiness: With error removed and correctness guiding, it is necessary that those in such condition would do finely and well in every action, and those doing well would be happy.  (Charmides 171e–172a)

Indeed, Socrates sometimes suggests a stronger thesis: this cognitive ­condition (which is identical to virtue) in fact constitutes happiness.7 The goal of life is to be in the right relation to the genuine goods. Sometimes this right relation is spelled out in terms of “using” the goods correctly, where cognitively grasping them is not this correct use itself but only a necessary condition of it (Meno 87d–89a, Laches 199d, Euthydemus 280b–282b).8 At other points it looks as if epistêmê is itself the right relation: simply knowing the good, which is being virtuous (in these contexts), is being happy (­perhaps implied by the claim that a good person cannot be harmed, at Apology 41d). In either case, the ethically salient distinction in epistemology, and thus the natural one for Plato to focus on in his epistemological investigations, will be the distinction between grasping what really is good and being stuck at the superficial level of what merely seems good. When we come to the Two Worlds dialogues, with their inflated metaphysical distinction between what Is and what seems, the importance of this cognitive distinction is correspondingly increased. Now Plato identifies as what is really good the Forms, and first and foremost the Form of the Good. Because the Good bestows Being (Republic 509b), what Is and what is good are now fully coextensive: the genuine goods are the Beings. (Becomings can be good only derivatively or indirectly, by participating in the Form of the Good: the “light” of the Good does not shine directly on them.) Thus the goal of being in touch with what really is good can now be reformulated as being in touch with what really Is. In other words, the goal of life is now to interact in the right way with the Forms. This view of eudaimonia is most vividly illustrated in the Republic’s Cave allegory, where the philosopher, the one who has escaped from the dark 7  For good discussion of the evidence and the controversy, see Bobonich 2011. 8  “Since we are all eager to be happy, and since we appear to become so by not only using things but using them correctly, and since it is epistêmê that provides correctness and good fortune, it seems that every person must prepare himself by every means so that he becomes as wise as possible” (Euthydemus 282a).

240 Conclusion cave of images to the light of Being and truth, rightly recognizes himself as happy (eudaimonizein) and pities those who remain behind (Republic 516c, cf. 518b). We see it clearly elsewhere too: to take just a few examples, in the Phaedo the goal of life is to escape the prison of the body to be in contact with the Forms; the Phaedrus has the same vision of the blessed afterlife. The dialogues that characterize ultimate reality as consisting in Forms also characterize eudaimonia as contact with those Forms, and characterize the life that ignores or fails to reach these as misspent.9 This view has something in common with one that is familiar to us, often as a response to skeptical scenarios. Plato uses the Cave allegory to repulse us from the life of the deluded prisoners, and thus make us realize that we value contact with reality; philosophers still make the same kind of argument two millennia on. Consider Nozick’s meditation on one upshot of his Experience Machine thought-experiment: We want to be importantly connected to reality, not to live in a d ­ elusion . . .  What we want and value is actual contact with reality. . . .  (Nozick 1989, 106)

Plato’s view goes beyond this, however: we should aspire to contact not merely with reality in the sense of what is actually the case, but with certain entities, the things that Are, for these are the very best things, and the best condition for us is thus a condition of being connected with them. Moreover, the Two Worlds dialogues make clear that the primary kind of contact we can have with these Beings—the way to interact with them, to “have” what is good—is cognitive contact. We come closest to the Forms by contemplating them, being aware of them, getting to know them, just as the escapee from the Cave beholds and contemplates the outer world and the sun. As the Didaskalikos puts it, “the good for humans is in the epistêmê and contemplation [theôria] of the primary good, which one might call God and the primary nous” (27.1). Plato does countenance other relations with Forms—we can and should love them, imitate them, and thereby come more fully to “participate” in 9  For a version of this argument based on a reading of Diotima’s speech in the Symposium see Wedgwood: “happiness consists in standing in the right relations to the intrinsic values” (2009, 308), where the intrinsic values turn out to be Forms. Wedgwood argues that the best relation to the Forms is instantiation, with cognition only indirectly serving this goal (because wisdom makes one more excellent and thus more like the Form of the Beautiful (2009, 312)); I will argue that cognition is itself the best relation.

Conclusion  241 them—but cognition is a necessary condition for these others.10 Moreover, it is cognition that he describes as actually constituting eudaimonia. Here is the Republic’s description of the person who achieves the goal of life, namely the philosopher: The real lover of learning strives by nature for what Is, and he would not linger over each of the many things which people have doxa of [doxazomenois] as being,11 but he will go on, and will not dull or let go of his erôs, until he touches the nature of each thing that Is [autou ho estin hekastou tês phuseôs]…by which, having approached and mixed with what really is [tôi onti ontôs], and having begat nous and truth, he has gnôsis and truly [alêthôs] lives, and is nourished. . . .  (Republic 490a–b)

The philosopher’s goal—which is the correct goal, the one everyone would aim at if they knew what was good—is contact with the Forms. This contact alone yields real happiness—the philosopher alone “truly lives” (by contrast with ordinary people who, as the Cave allegory puts it, are dreaming). Moreover, this contact, described though it is here in sexual terms, is clearly cognitive. The philosopher’s goal is to have excellent cognition of the Forms, and this is living well. We see the same idea in the Phaedrus’s divine myth. When the soul after death is disembodied and unencumbered, it is finally able to gaze on the Forms, which are what really are, and are the objects of real epistêmê;12 now, finally, it is contented (agapâi) and feels good (eupathei) (Phaedrus 247c–d). We see it also in the Symposium: the life worth living (biôton, 211d), the life that is the goal (telos) of erotic education, is the life in which one has gnôsis of what Is beautiful, and is “contemplating and being-with [the Form of Beauty]…not laying hold of an image . . . but laying hold of the real thing [tou alêthous]” (Symposium 212a).13 10  See for example Republic 500c: the philosophers, “looking at and beholding [horôntas kai theômenous] [the Forms]…imitate them and make themselves as much as possible like them.” Compare Timaeus 90a–d, where we become like the divine harmonies of the cosmos, and thereby obtain the goal of life, through contemplating and understanding those harmonies. More generally, Plato almost always describes philosophers’ contact with the Forms using visual metaphors, which are metaphors for cognition. 11  τοῖς δοξαζομένοις εἶναι πολλοῖς ἑκαστοις. 12  οὐσία ὄντως οὖσα . . . περὶ ἣν τὸ τῆς ἀληθοῦς ἐπιστήμης γένος (Phaedrus 247c). 13  Here the soul goes on to beget true virtue, and thereby become immortal. Does this show that cognitive contact with reality is of merely instrumental value? One could interpret it that way, but more plausibly such contact is constitutive of this begetting and immortality, wholly or in part.

242 Conclusion We see it very clearly in the Phaedo: the goal of life for the philosopher—which is the true goal of life, i.e. true happiness, by contrast with the things wrongly thought worth pursuing by lovers of the body—is to grasp Being through reasoning with the soul itself apart from the body, i.e. to cognize Being and thereby “obtain truth and wisdom [ktêsashtai alêtheian te kai phronêsin]” (Phaedo 65c–66a). As in the Cave allegory, this should be our goal in life: to escape confused cognition of the ontologically inferior, and to gain cognition of what Is. Thus the Two World’s dialogues answer to the question “How should one live?” centrally involves cognitive contact with the ultimate Beings. Such contact is at a minimum a crucial component of the goal of life, enabling other goods like imitation of these Beings; in many places, Plato’s view seems to be simply that such contact is the goal of life—is happiness itself. Thus when Plato turns his mind in these dialogues to what we would call epistemological questions, his target—his ideal, the privileged kind he wants to explain and recommend—is precisely this eudaimonia-conferring cognition of Being. That is the centerpiece of his epistemology, and therefore that is what he emphasizes and dignifies with labels like ‘noêsis,’ ‘phronêsis, ‘epistêmê.’ Meanwhile, these dialogues clearly identify the chief obstacle to living well as excessive attachment to what merely seems, the ontologically in­fer­ ior. The Cave allegory again provides a good illustration: the prisoners are pitiable because they are stuck in the Cave, i.e. in the realm of Becoming; worse, they are ignorant of their own plight and thus have no motivation to escape it. If this is the central ethical danger, then when Plato turns his mind to epistemology the condition salient to him as inferior will be the one that keeps us in the Cave: dream-like cognition that mistakes what seems for reality. Given his ethical concerns, this is the kind of cognition he thinks we must be on our guard against—that we must identify, learn to recognize, and try to avoid. That is why he chooses doxa as the deficient counterpart of epistêmê, the negative focus of his epistemological inquiries. For Plato, the bright line in ethics is between blessed contact with Being and pitiable immersion in seeming. Therefore the bright line in e­ pistemology— the salient division between higher and lower—is the line between accepting what seems as final, and going beyond this to find what Is.

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Index Locorum For the benefit of digital users, indexed terms that span two pages (e.g., 52–53) may, on occasion, appear on only one of those pages. AESCHYLUS Seven Against Thebes 529–4 146 ALCINOUS Didaskalikos 4.2–8 36 4.5  203n.9, 230–1 27.1 240 ANTIPHON Second Tetralogy 3.2.2 146 ARISTOTLE Categories 2b5–6 102 Posterior Analytics 88b37 43n.66 88b30–89a3 43 89a3–4 43n.66 89a6–8 44 89a23–37 80n.46 Topics 114a23 44 De Anima 402b9–16  16, 61 404b16–27 69 409b26–7 68 415a16–22,16–2215 418a24–5 62 434a10–12 150n.20 Metaphysics 981a10 127n.30 981a12–23 127 981a24–30 204n.14 987b14–18 189 987a32–b1 35 1019a1–4 102 1019a4–6 102n.33 1021a33–b2 63 1028a10–15 101–2

1028a34–6 61–2 1028b19–21 189 1049b12–17 61–2 1078b12–17  35, 82 Nicomachean Ethics 1138b27  7n.13, 21n.16 1138b26–32 44n.70 1139a6–12  16, 43, 65–6 1139a8–11 67 1139b19–21 44 1139b20–4 43n.65 1140a1–2 38n.55 1140b25–28  16, 43, 65n.24 Magna Moralia 1196b15–29 66–7 CICERO Academica I.30–32 36 II.142 157 DAMASCIUS, In Phaedonem 1.102–3 192 DIONYSIUS OF HALICARNASSUS De Compositione Verborum 45.17 45 EMPEDOCLES B 109  68 FICINO, Divini Platonis Opera Omnia 6 40n.61 92 203 93 40 GALEN On the Sects for Beginners 5  204 GORGIAS Helen 10 149 13 149 Palamedes 24 149–50 33 146

250  Index Locorum HERACLITUS B28 148 ISOCRATES Against the Sophists 8 129 Antidosis 52–4 232n.21 184  45, 122–3, 129 271  45, 129 OLYMPIODORUS In Platonis Phaedonem 5.4 183 5.13 192 PARMENIDES B1.28–32 147 B8.50–62 147n.13 PLATO Euthyphro 4e–5a 209–10 5a 4 6d–e  200–1, 208–9, 213–14 11a  95–6, 208–10 Apology 21c  149, 213n.11 21d 213n.11 28b 236 29b 213n.11 29d–e 238n.5 29d–30b 238 36d 238n.6 41d 239 Crito 48b 238n.5 53b–c 213 Phaedo 65a–66a  106, 174n.31, 242 65c–e 106 65d 94n.18 65e 183 66b–67b  23, 23n.21, 27, 191–2 74b  145n.8, 158 74b–c  21n.14, 71–2, 117, 161n.11, 177, 17974d–76d  97, 208–9 75b–d  96–7, 178 76b  6, 98n.28 77a 96–7 78d–e  33, 71–2, 96–8, 161n.11 79a–b  33, 71, 7879c–d  33–4, 35n.49, 71–4, 79, 118, 167

79c–80b 72 82d–83d 168–9 83b 162–3 83b–84a  33–4, 119, 119n.17 83c–84a 72–3 84a  114–15, 155, 161 84a–b 78 90c 76–7 96b 171n.24 100c  103, 115, 186 Cratylus 439c–440d 35n.49 Theaetetus 145b–e 236–7 146c–e 219n.1 152a 221n.5 152a–d 223–5 152c  90–1, 114n.2, 221 152d–e 223 152d–160c 35n.49 158a 222 158e 221n.5 161c–d 222–3 166e–167c 223n.7 170a–c 222–3 172b  149, 222 174b–175d 200 177c–d 222 179c 222–3 184e–185a 54 184b–186e  54–5, 91–2, 169n.21, 225–7 186e 221 187b  4, 219 189e–190a  140, 171n.25, 192, 210n.5, 227–9 191c–195a 230–1 193c 37 194d 156n.1 195e–196a 37n.52 201a–c  6, 151n.22, 158–9, 231–2 201a–210d 230–3 201c–d  5, 6n.9, 21–2, 140, 155 207b–c 232–3 208e 22n.19 209a–b 182n.41 Sophist 233c 151n.22 234c–d  151, 160, 231 234d–e 160

Index Locorum  251 235d–236c 156 236e  149, 165–6 240b 163–6 242c–e 103–4 248a 96–7 251a 178n.34 254a–b 160n.9 263b 156 263e–264a  140, 156, 171n.25, 171n.27, 192, 210n.5, 228–9 263e–264b 171n.27 264a  147n.13, 169n.21 Statesman 284a–e 131 294a–296e 131 Parmenides 134a 86n.2 Philebus 11b  228–9, 236–7 21b 228–9 34a 37 35a 58n.14 38b 37 38b–39a  140, 171n.25, 228–9 39a 169–71 56b 116–17 57b–d 161n.10 58a  34, 75–6 58a–59b 75–6 58c–59d  71–2, 106, 116, 228–9 59a–b  35n.49, 79, 97, 117–18, 128, 161n.11 59c–d 34 Symposium 202a 156 204a 239 210e–211b  35n.49, 71–2, 117, 161n.11 211a–b  98, 178, 212a 241 Phaedrus 247c–d  34, 96–7, 114–15, 241 247c–248b 106 249c 97n.24 250a–b 97 250a–d 178–9 250d 163–4 260a  151–2, 159–60, 231 261c–d  152, 231 267a 147n.13 270d 28

270d–271e 59n.16 272c 152 Alcibiades I 117a–b 213 Charmides 159a 210n.5 167e 58n.14 167e–168d  6, 56–8, 62–4, 86n.1 168a 64 168d 54 165c–d 52–3 171e–172a 239 174c 236n.2 Laches 191e 208–10 199a 59–60 199d  236n.2, 239 Euthydemus 280b–282b  236n.2, 238n.5, 239 Protagoras 312c–e 59–60 356d–e  72, 116–17, 158, 161 356d–357a 158 358b–d 237 Gorgias 447c 59–60 449d 59–60 451d 59–60 454d  4, 114n.2, 147n.13 454e 159 455a 159 459b–c  151, 158 463b 59n.16 464a  149, 151 465a 201–2 465c 160 466e–468d  13–14, 57 467a 238 468c 63–4 500c 236 501a  201–2, 233n.23 Meno 71a 209–10 71a–b  6, 209–10 72a–d  200–1, 208–10 72b–c  208–9, 217 77a–78a  57, 237 81c 6 81c–86b 6n.8 85c–d  212, 214, 216

252  Index Locorum PLATO (cont.) 87d–89a  236n.2, 238–9 97a–b  6, 214, 231–2 97d 4 98a  5–6, 6n.9, 21–2, 40n.62, 71–2, 83, 115–17, 116n.10, 158, 161n.10, 211, 214, 216 98b  1, 83 Hippias Major 287c–288a  201, 213–14 Hippias Minor 372d–e 213 373d–e 52–3 375d–376a 53n.3 Ion 537c–538a 59–60 Republic 334b 179 334c–335a 148 340c 148 346a 126 349a–350e  179, 181–2 352d 236 353a 25–6 357a–b 148 358a 148 361b–362a  146, 148 365b–c  146, 156 367b–d 148 402b–c 127n.28 412e–414a  130n.36, 155 413a–c  116–17, 156 414b–c 158 428b–d  75–6, 126, 191, 236–7 430a 158 437d–438d  57–9, 62–3 438d  21n.16, 27, 75–6, 191 443e 21–2 475e  114–15, 155 475e–476a 177–8 476a 181–2 476b  98n.28, 166 476c  163–4, 166, 175n.32, 176, 184, 197–8, 200, 228 476d–e  4, 183n.43 476d–477a 109–11 476e–477b 88–90 477a  86, 89n.5, 96–7, 100, 105 477b 26n.24 477c–480a  18–29, 52–6, 88–90, 105, 121, 197–8

477d–478e  6, 15–18 477e  4, 15, 16n.5, 17, 18n.9, 83, 197 477e–478b 28 478a  16nn.5–6, 17–18, 52–6, 86 478a–c  64, 71–2, 74 478e  161–3, 165–6 479a–b  35n.49, 98, 100–1, 117, 161n.11, 166 479c–e  6, 19, 29n.29, 97, 100–1, 106, 117 480a 198–9 484b  71–2, 116, 161n.10 484c–d  19n.10, 124–6 490a–b  71, 73–4, 240–1 500b–d 78 500c 241n.10 505d 148 500e–501c  124, 130–1, 163–4 505a–e 237 506a–e  21–2, 177, 181–2, 186–7, 190–1507b  96–7, 97n.24, 98n.28, 181–2, 208–9 507c–e 54 508d  29, 33–4, 73–5, 79, 105–6, 114–16, 118–19, 162–3 509b  103, 239 509d–510a  34, 117, 161, 167, 169, 171–2, 174n.31 509d–511e 75 510a  161, 163–4, 167, 198n.1 510b–511a 182–5 510c  187–8, 195n.63 511a 161n.10 511c 188 511d  1n.2, 51n.2, 64, 142n.4, 147n.13, 182–3 511d–e  77–8, 182–5 511e  71–2, 114–15, 119 515a–c  166, 171–2 515d 166–7 515e 200n.3 516a 163–4 516c 239–40 516c–517a 125 516d  167n.19, 198n.1 517b  162, 198n.1 517c 115n.7 517d–e  169, 172–3 518b 239–40 518c  50, 73–4, 97n.26 519b  115n.6, 119, 166–7

Index Locorum  253 520c  21–2, 125, 198 521c–d  105–6, 175, 198 523a–524d  164–5, 175–7, 199 523e 54n.9 524a  35n.49, 54, 71–2, 77–8, 117 524c  116–17, 179–80 525c 115n.6 527b 115n.6 529b–d  31, 128, 184 529b–530b 120–1 529d–530b  35n.49, 71–2, 117, 125–6 532b–c 185 533a–c  155–86, 189–90, 194–5 533d  182–3, 188, 195n.63 533d–e 182–3 533e–534b  156–85, 177n.33 534a  6, 31, 106, 161, 183–4 534b–c  6, 152–3, 185, 198, 233 539e–540a 126n.27 585d  119, 162–3 595b 183n.43 596e 165–6 597a–d  96–7, 100, 162–3 598a  158, 164, 172n.28 599d–600e 164 600e 198 601c–d 21n.15 601e–602a  75–6, 191 602b  151n.22, 198 602e–603a  171, 172n.28 611e 73–4 Timaeus 27d–28a  6, 32, 38–9, 46, 97, 100, 105, 117, 119, 129–30, 161–4, 167, 170–1, 174n.31, 203 29b–c  76, 129–30, 147n.13, 163–4 37b–c  32, 70, 71n.32, 129–30, 147n.13, 161, 198–9 46d–e 115 50c– 163–4 51d  83, 159, 223–4, 234–5 52a  6, 32, 34, 129–30, 161, 161n.11, 167 52c 162–4 67b–c 54

77b 169–70 90a–d  77–8, 240–1 Definitions 414b–c  71–2, 116–17, 158 413c 116–17 PLOTINUS Ennead V 1.4 135 5.1 47 5.8 46 9.7 46 Ennead VI 9.3 46 PLUTARCH Adversus Colotem 13  37, 46 De Iside et Osiride 383c–d 46 PROCLUS In Timaeum 2.240–64  39n.60, 46 2.243.18–22 39 2.248 11–22  203 2.248.16–17 54n.9 2.249.2–3 39 2.249.8–9 38 2.249.13–27  39, 203n.12 2.254.24–27 38 2.255.3–12 39 2.339.14–17 38 2.343.10–11 203 Theologica Platonica, I.15.17–20  38 In Parmenidem I.617 135 SEXTUS EMPIRICUS Against the Mathematicians 7.147–9 45 Outlines of Pyrrhonism 2.97–129 204 SIMONIDES 76 148 XENOPHANES B34 147 B35 150

Index For the benefit of digital users, indexed terms that span two pages (e.g., 52–53) may, on occasion, appear on only one of those pages. Adam, J.  18n.7, 21n.15, 22n.20, 41, 55n.10, 78n.45, 103n.36, 123n.22, 152–3, 178n.34 Alcinous, see under Didaskalikos Allen, R.E.  163 Annas, J.  7n.19, 18n.7, 21n.15, 25, 54–5, 94, 115n.9, 162n.12 Antiphon 146 Aristotle cognition of like by like in  67–9 Distinct Objects epistemology in  19–45, 65–7, 79–80 doxa in, see under doxa empeiria in, see under empeiria epistêmê in, see under epistêmê interpretation of Plato  35–6, 69–70, 82–3, 101–3, 189 ontological superiority (primary being) in 101–2 phronêsis (practical wisdom), see under phronêsis powers, activities, and objects  15–17, 61–3, 65–7 technê (craft)  127–8 Armstrong, D.  1n.3, 24n.23 Arruzza, C.  123,

and essence  94, 96, 98–9, 107–8, 133–4, 208–12 and Forms, see under Forms as the real or ontologically superior, see under ontological superiority belief and doxa, see under doxa de re 193–4 and propositions, see under propositions two kinds: opinion and judgment  140, 157–8, 206 Benson, H.  7n.19, 59–60 Bobonich, C.  239n.7 Bosanquet, B.  7n.11, 22n.20, 41n.63, 94, 133, 143–4, 144n.7, 204–5 Boylu, A.  18n.7 Boys–Stones, G.  37n.53, 46 Bradley, F.H.  135–6 Broadie, S.  129–30 Bronstein, D.  211n.8 Brown, L.  18n.7, 94 Bryan, J.  129n.34, 147n.13 Burnyeat, M.  7n.19, 90n.7, 91n.10, 94, 115n.9, 129n.34, 169n.21, 220n.3, 226n.11, 227n.13 Butler, T  18n.7

Baltzly, D.  18n.7, 20, 42, 182n.40, 201n.4 Barnes, J.  13n.1 Barney, R.  237n.3 being contrasted with becoming  6, 31–2, 76–7, 97–8, 105–6, 162–4, 225, 234–5, 239 contrasted with seeming, see under seeming existential, predicative, veridical and other senses 94–6 and epistêmê  86–93, 105–8, see also under Forms

Carone, G.  63 Carpenter, A.  21n.14, 117n.11 Carriero, J.  7, 47, 135 Cave allegory  19–22, 31, 75, 84–5, 105–6, 124–5, 141, 156–89, 198, 240–2 Cicero  36, 157 cognition, cognitive as general terms covering doxa and epistêmê 51 like by like doctrine of in Aristotle 67–9 like by like doctrine of in Plato 69–79 Cooper, J.M.  94, 126n.27, 226n.11

Index  255 Cornford, F.M.  3n.5, 11–12, 17, 22n.20, 40–1, 69–70, 90n.7, 94, 103n.37, 140n.1, 144–5, 162, 202–3, 226, 228n.14, 230n.18 craft, see under technê Crombie, I.M.  1n.2, 4n.6, 7n.16, 42, 54n.8, 134, 140n.1, 170n.23, 202–3 Cross, R.C.  20, 24, 231–2 Damascius  23n.21, 192 Devereux, D.  127, 130–1 dianoia (“thought”)  182–90 Didaskalikos  36–7, 203n.9, 230nn.18–19 Dillon, J.  36 Dionysius of Halicarnassus  45 Distinct Objects epistemology in Aristotle, see under Aristotle evidence for in Plato  26–35, 52–61, 79–82 in early and Middle Platonists  15–45 in Isocrates  14–45 in medieval and modern philosophy  47 in the Meno 214–17 in Neoplatonists  46, 155 in Parmenides  37, 40, 42, 134, 174 in the Theaetetus  220–4, 230–3 doxa and atheoretical thought  199–202 and belief  2–8, 14–24, 42, 48, 84, 140–3, 157–8, 205–6, 227–9 and dreaming  197–9, 202 and empeiria, see under empeiria and perception  54–5, 161, 169–71 and propositions, see under propositions, propositional attitudes Basic Conception of  141–2, 196–7 in Aristotle  44, 82n.48, 150, 229 historical interpretations of  7 for doxa  35–42, 202–5 in Isocrates  45, 232n.21 in Parmenides  146, 151n.21, 205n.16 in Platonists  7, 203–4 in the earlier dialogues  213–14 in the Philebus and Sophist 228–9 in the Theaetetus  222–3, 227–9, 231–2 object vs. subject senses  145–6 nonstandard uses of the word  21n.16, 27 recent interpretations of  2, 7–8, 48, 202–3 reflective vs. passive  171–4 true vs. false  155–7 two kinds  191–2, 227–9 and what seems  143–4, 149–53

Ebrey, D.  71n.32, 72n.33 eikos (likely)  129–30, 147n.13 eikasia (imagination)  31n.33, 75, 157, 171–4 Empedocles  68–70, 72–3 empeiria (experience)  125–7, 202, 204 epistêmê and being, see under being and definitions  222 and essences  133–4, 209–10 and eudaimonia 237–42 and explanation  6, 115–16, 211–12 and knowledge  2–8, 23, 42, 48, 84, 137–8 and metaphysics  135–6 and nous, see under nous and propositions, see under propositions and science  7, 41–2, 64–5, 122, 133–5 and Scientia  7, 36, 39–40, 47, 133, 135 and understanding  7–8, 11–12, 115–16, 133–6, 211 Basic Conception of  111–12, 136 counterparts in Parmenides and Heraclitus 134 historical interpretations of  7, 35–42, 133 in Aristotle  7, 44, 134–5, 211–12 in Isocrates  14–45, 122 in Plato’s time  13–14 in the earlier dialogues  208–12 in the Theaetetus  90–2, 220–2, 226–7, 232–3 nonstandard uses of the word  21n.16, 27, 51–75, 191 recent interpretations of  2, 7–8, 48, 133–4 synonyms for  1n.2, 27, 242 epistemology, contemporary vs. Platonic  1–3, 234–5, see also under belief and under knowledge ethics Ancient and modern, as analogy to epistemology 8–10 relation to Plato’s epistemology  236–42 Everson, S.  2n.4, 50n.1 explanation (aitia), see under epistêmê Ficino, M.  39–40, 203 Fine, G.  2n.4, 3n.5, 9n.23, 13n.2, 18n.7, 20–1, 21n.16, 23, 25–6, 27n.25, 28, 30, 34n.44, 44n.67, 53n.5, 78n.44, 88n.4, 93n.16, 94, 100n.31, 122–3, 125, 128, 137n.5, 138, 140n.3, 162n.12, 164–5, 180n.38, 187, 191n.56, 214, 232n.20

256 Index Fine, K.  101–2 Forms and Being  19, 96–100, 103, 105–7, 225 and doxa  177–81, 190–5 and epistêmê  19–20, 27–34, 71–9, 82–4, 117–22 Frede, M.  135n.3, 169n.21, 204, 220n.2 Galen 204 Gallop, D.  34n.44, 72n.35, 97n.23, 183, 189 Geach, P.T.  210n.3 Gerson, L.  11–12, 21n.14, 65, 116n.10, 133–4, 182n.41, 183, 203n.9, 211n.7, 216n.15 Gettier, E.  1n.3, 230n.17 Gonzalez, F.  18n.7, 21n.14, 29n.29, 123n.22, 133–4, 183, 194n.62 Gorgias of Leontini  146, 149–50 Gosling, J.C.B.  9n.23, 18n.7, 20, 42, 204–5 Grönroos, G.  171n.27, 229 Gulley, N.  7n.16, 11–12, 140n.1, 143n.5, 204–5 Hackforth, R.  7n.11, 204–5 Harte, V.  18n.7, 20, 25–6, 28n.28, 80, 162n.12, 193n.61, 194n.62, 202–3, 217n.16 Havelock, E.A.  140n.1, 143–4, 204–5 Heraclitus  35, 68, 82, 134 Hicks, R.D.  62n.19, 69n.30, 71n.31 Horwich, P.  135–6 Hume 47 infallibility  4, 17, 123 Irwin, T.  188n.47 Isocrates  44–5, 122–3, 232n.21 Joachim, H.  71n.31 Johansen, T.  16n.4, 62 Jowett, B.  7n.11, 22n.20, 41n.63, 133 Kahn, C.  21n.14, 94, 98, 109 Kamtekar, R.  18n.7, 20, 25–6, 28n.28, 63n.21, 80, 217n.16 knowledge by acquaintance vs. by description  231–2 and epistêmê, see under epistêmê and propositions, see under propositions LaFrance, Y.  181n.39 Lautner, P.  39n.59, 46n.75, 203n.12

Lear, G.R.  145n.8 Lee, D.  94n.17 Leibniz  7n.14, 47, 135n.4 Lesher, J.  116–17, 118n.13, 134n.2 Locke 47 Lyons, J.  27n.25 McDaniel, K.  102n.34 metaphysics, relation to Plato’s epistemology  10, 82–4, 214–18 Modrak, D.  226n.11 Moline, J.  2n.4, 11–12, 95n.20, 99n.30, 115n.9, 134 Moravcsik, J.  7n.19 Moss, J.  8n.20, 44n.71, 74, 137n.5, 142n.4, 162n.12, 171nn.25,27, 227n.13, 229, 237n.3 Mourelatos, A.  129n.34, 147n.13 Murphy, N.R.  41, 181n.39 Nehamas, A.  7n.19, 11–12, 115n.9, 163n.14, 211n.6 Nettleship, R.L.  204–5 Nietzsche 162 nomima (conventions)  19n.10, 124 nous in Plato  1n.2, 183–4 in Aristotle  134–5, 212 in Parmenides and Heraclitus  42, 134 in NeoPlatonists  39, 46 Nozick, R.  240 Olympiodorus  23n.21, 183, 192 ontological superiority  87–107, 134–6, 153, 208–9, 223–7 in Aristotle, see under Aristotle and fundamentality  88–102 and reality vs. appearance  104, 110, and see under seeming and truth  114–15 opinion, see under belief Overlap readings (“One World” epistemology)  14–26, 80–1 Palmer, J.  42n.64, 151n.21 Parmenides  37, 40, 42, 46, 101, 103–4, 134, 146–7, 151n.21, 174, 205n.16 Pasnau, R.  9n.22, 47n.77 Peramatzis, M.  62n.18, 102n.35 perception, see under doxa

Index  257 Perin, C.  117n.11 pistis (conviction)  27, 32, 129–30, 147n.13, 171–4, 176–7, 188n.50 Poulakos, T.  45n.72 Prior, W.  210n.4 phantasia (appearance)  147n.13, 169n.21, 171n.27, 229 phronêsis as eqivalent to epistêmê  1n.2, 27, 33–4, 72–3, 106n.42 in Aristotle  66, 130–1 and philosopher–rulers  130–1 philosopher–rulers 122–31 pistis (conviction)  1n.2, 27, 31n.33, 32, 75–7, 114n.2, 129–30, 147n.13, 157, 171–4, 176–7, 184n.44–45, 188n.50 Platonists: see under Alcinous, Damascius, Ficino, Olympiodorus, Plotinus, Proclus, Plutarch Plotinus  38, 46–7, 135 Plutarch  14–37, 46 power (dunamis) and objects and accomplishments  52–80 in Aristotle  15–16, 61–9 powers argument (Republic 476e–480a)  14–19, 28–9, 52–6, 60–1, 86, 88–90, 95–6, 100–1, 121, 133, 144, 197–8 practical wisdom, see under phronêsis precision (akribeia)  71–2, 75–6, 116–18, 120, 129 Proclus  7, 20, 135, 203 Distinct Objects epistemology  46 interpretation of Plato  38–9, 70 propositions, as relata of epistêmê, doxa, knowledge and belief  9n.23, 20–1, 23n.22, 28–30, 43–4, 66n.26, 84, 93–4, 138, 140–1, 205–6, 235 reality, see under ontological superiority rhetoric  59–60, 151–2, 158–60, 231–2 Rowe, C.J.  31n.36, 133n.1 Rowett, C.  8n.21, 133n.1, 204–5 Schofield, M.  205n.17 Schwab, W.  11–12, 13n.1, 31n.36, 44n.71, 7nn.19–20, 115n.9, 116, 129, 133, 161–2, 211n.6, 229, 142nn.4–5

science, see under epistêmê Scientia, see under epistêmê Scott, D.  37, 46 Sedley  21n.14, 23n.21, 123n.22, 124n.23, 189, 189n.51, 230–1 seeming and doxa, see under doxa contrast with Being  146–9 ontological 145–6 and perceptibles  162, 165–74 Sextus Empiricus  45, 148, 204 Shorey, P.  7n.11, 19n.10, 41n.63, 133 Simonides 148 Sierksma–Agteres, S.  46 Silverman, A.  94, 99n.29, 130n.37, 133–4 Smith, N.D.  9n.23, 18n.7, 20, 21n.13, 25–6, 80, 121–3, 128, 181n.39, 186–8, 193n.61, 202–3, 21nn.15–16 Snell, B.  1n.2 sophia Spinoza  7n.14, 47, 135n.4 Sprute, J.  7n.16, 11–12, 140, 140n.1, 143n.5, 204–5, 228 stability  71–2, 76, 98, 116–18, 120, 158, 218, 223–4 Stokes, M.  18n.7, 94, 200, 201n.4 Storey, D.  169n.21 summoners argument (Republic 523a–524d)  164–5, 175–7 Szaif, J.  9n.23, 18n.7, 20, 21n.13, 50n.1, 74n.39, 96n.22, 114n.4, 119n15, 181n.39 Taylor, A.  7, 133 Taylor, C.C.W.  18n.7, 94n.17, 181n.39 technê (craft)  52–3, 59–60, 75–6, 81, 126–8, 191, 201–2 truth  113–15, 155–7 Two Worlds epistemology – see under Distinct Objects epistemology Two Worlds dialogues  19–20 understanding, see under epistêmê van Inwagen, P.  102n.34, 104n.38 Vasiliou, I.  126n.27 Vlastos, G.  7n.17, 21n.14, 94, 95n.20, 115n.5, 116n.10, 118n.14, 163n.14, 236n.2

258 Index Vogt, K.  8n20, 18n.7, 20, 22n.17, 23–6, 28n.28, 41, 140nn.1,3, 143n.5, 144n.7, 148n.16, 157n.4, 161–2, 180nn.37,38, 182n.40, 187, 202–3, 216n.15, 228 von Fritz, K.  134n.2

White, N.  11–12 Wolterstorff, N.  7n.15, 135n.4 Woodruff, P.  7n.18 Woolf, R.  21n.14, 182n.41 Woozley, A.D., see under Cross

Wedgwood, R.  191n.55, 240n.9 White, F.C.  91n.9

Xenophanes  147, 150 Zeller, E.  40